In Victoria, 40C used to be known as “A Hot Day”, but now thanks to climate change it’s called an “extreme condition” (wasn’t it meant to become a common event?) Nevermind.
The AEMO (Australian Energy Market Operator) has pretty much warned us the Victorian electrical grid can no longer cope with “a hot day”.
[The AEMO] predicts a one-in-three chance of load shedding under extreme conditions this summer unless additional action is taken.
“Specifically, temperatures of 40C or more in Victoria could be the catalyst for extreme, one-in-10-year electricity demand conditions.
“Particularly when these temperatures are experienced towards the end of the day when business demand is still relatively high, residential demand is increasing, and rooftop PV’s contribution is declining.”
So since solar PV is useless in this situation, the Victorian government is spending one billion dollars installing Solar PV. One billion dollars of generation that is guaranteed not to work when we need it.
Will the new PM, Scott Morrison, be able to solve this problem? Thousands of engineers can.
Once upon a time even the brainless inanimate free market did.
h/t Dave B, Pat
PS: Still travelling.
“Specifically, temperatures of 40C or more in Victoria could be the catalyst for extreme, one-in-10-year electricity demand conditions.” Is 40C really an extreme, one-in-10-year condition?
Congratulations to you for a new PM.
230
This was going to my point as well. They use a figure like this without the slightest hint of understanding what it means. They are an insult to engineers everywhere.
Melbourne is known to have four seasons in one day. It’s just close enough to the arctic that the cold arctic vortexes will touch it. So it could be a cool morning, a hot day, a windy afternoon, and a freezing evening.
Rainfall and Temperature Records for Victoria:
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/extreme/records.shtml#victoria
Looks like 40C isn’t unusual at all.
323
G’day,
40 is certainly hot, and I usually only get a couple of days each summer. But perhaps they’re acknowledging that at least some batteries decide it’s too hot for them also, so the “backup” they provide may not be available from that source either?
Cheers,
Dave B
170
I wonder what they base one in 10 years on? seems to me that we regularly get some 40’s in summer. I arrived here in Feb 1982 and hot one of those days , the dry furnace like heat was very different to the humidity in Sydney.
One in 10 years seems more a summer wehere you dont get some 40C days.
80
In Melbourne you can have a hot day after rain, so sometimes the day is humid, frequently there are summer storms after hot days which can make for a humid next day. Humid air costs a lot more to refrigerate than dry air, so days approaching 40 and humid are the more likely catalyst.
20
yep, been here for 36 years now, I think I get it. Humdity is not common in Melbourne and you have to create scenarios for it to be a big factor unlike Sydney and Brisbane.
00
40 is not unusual in Melbourne. In fact a summer without a number of days higher than 40 is what would be unusual. 50 years ago, when I was in what is now called high school we had regular days over 40 in February. 1962 is are well remembered for huge bushfires.
Nothing much has changed. More recent fires are ‘seen’ as being worse, but the reality is the Black Friday fires in 1939 were far worse than the Black Saturday fires in 2009. The main difference is the loss of life. In 1939 hardly anybody lived in the forests. These days it’s all the people seeking “tree change” that suffer; and it is Green policies that are mostly at fault. People are not allowed to clear fuel, such as fallen branches or trees, in case a possum might call it home. Lord knows, we don’t have enough possums….. Says me, as I hear one in my ceiling as I type.
111
I blame the victorian Communists ,namely Red Andr*ws. They have turned the victorian population into a bunch of speedo watching victims, who panic about going 0.5 km/ h over the speed limit lest a local plod may pull them up, or as more likely in the rapidly failing state and all-round tin pot Dictatorship of Zimvabw…er….Victimtoria, get shot.
Now, just like Zimbabwe, the power will become unreliable. How long before we start seeing farm seizures too?
Been torturously trying to understand microwave engineering and Maxwells equations from a standing start …puts me in a bad mood….but the Victimtoria stuff still stands…..
62
Ah…the point i was actually getting to, was that after a decade of emotional manipulation and political monstering if Victorians, they are now basket cases. Add to this that now a rather hot day is a “world ending event”, or a lot if rain an ” extreme weather event”, victorians have had thier brains shattered, a bit like sticking someone in a shipping container for days without skeep and playing a nursery rhyme at 100 dbA, until thier brain snaps….
Victorians have been mentally assaulted and worn down by evil and pathetic people, namely the nasty pinko commie sons of guns who need to be voted out with extreme conviction lest victoria completely collapse and truly become the Zimbabwe of Australia.
Interestingly, I heard this talk from a christian missionary who was ex-south african army who while in Zambia, feared communists more than any others, as they had a special type of interrogation technique that was greatly feared, like heads shoved into buckets of urine or faeces…
Interestingly, Zambia became a Christian nation and rejected Communism, resestablished freedom of religion and relaxed gun laws….whereas Australia….
102
Victoria has definitely become a ‘strange’ place. I think Bangkok looks attractive.
41
You need to relocate some NZ greenies into your forests. They are very keen on killing Australian possums.
10
All is not lost, our local member down here at Goulburn is Angus Taylor, and he is the new Energy Minister. He is pretty much up to speed on the renewables rorts and the need for coal fired baseload.
71
Good. We’re killing the RET.
Who is the new minister for exiting Paris?
40
Looks like we aren’t leaving Paris.
‘Nationals MP Keith Pitt, formerly assistant minister to the deputy prime minister, said yesterday he would quit his portfolio in protest at the government remaining in the Paris Agreement.’ Oz
00
RenewEconomy have lambasted him as the new “anti-wind’ Energy Minister and is also frothing at the mouth with Melissa Price (a former mining company lawyer) being given the Environment portfolio.
https://reneweconomy.com.au/morrison-names-leading-anti-wind-campaigner-as-energy-minister-49560/
With these 2 plus the Energy portfolio being split from Environment, Scott Morrison has got off to a good start, IMO.
Whether the general electorate has the nous to appreciate it remains to be seen – the ABC/SBS/Fairfax conglomerate are spreading the word that the Coalition faces virtual extermination with the ousting of Turncoat. Mind you, these are the agencies that had Shillary as a dead cert 2 years ago.
00
Every year from 1999 to 2016 some site in Melbourne hit 40C. So you have become a country that has managed its electrical grid to conditions found in 1930?
I can not believe anyone would find this acceptable!
352
Not many air conditioners in 1930, but your point is valid nevertheless. Victoria was a net electricity exporter until around a year ago. Now we are a net importer. From states who barely have enough for themselves. It’s madness, but insanity has gripped this country for more than ten years, based on so called “science” which is settled, apparently.
100
Victoria has deluberately run down its generating capcity.
In Communist thought, independence of any one state from others in the planned Australian version of the USSR is a big no no.
Blackouts also nake the people depend on the priblrm the govt has deluberately created. Communists are basket cases anyway, but they want to inflict thuer disfunctionality and foolishness on the population.
Communism doesnt work, has never work, and never will work. Its the ultimate expression of stupidity and insanity in one system.
50
It is sad to see leftists/greenies by whatever label destroy the reliability of electrical power in a great nation.
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The UK has ~19.2GW of windmill industrial complexes, at periods between last Sunday and Wednesday it was providing 0 or negligible, all that distributed wind generation machinery useless, becalmed nationwide wide.
Incidentally, the BBC especially, has scarcely mentioned the reasons behind your new PM – just called it destructive infighting. There’s a surprise.
460
Delingpole’s on it: https://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/08/24/another-greenie-bites-the-dust-aussie-pm-forced-out-by-climate-policy/
Not the BBC, but the word’s out.
311
Saw a similar comment on WUWT about the LA Times – also didn’t mention the power issues in relation to Empty leaving.
10
And if Victoria has blackouts what about South Australia? It’s even more meshed in the renewables scam, and when the hot winds blow from the NW a lot of wind turbines shut down because it is too hot for them to operate safely. And when the winds don’t blow then the State relies on electricity from Victoria also.
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Yeah but they spent half a billion dollars getting gas/diesel turbines in place so they can say they are green. VIC is just going down the same road, at some stage they will be rescuing us from grid instability or lack of timely capacity.
80
Frankly the citizenry should be incensed, half a billion dollars to buy generators that will run for a few hours a year. Truly, would you buy a bmw for $150,000 and just leave it in the garage for when the $20,000 family sedan is in the shop for maintenance? Greenies are soooo wasteful, they go on about waste but they create so much. Just think of All the disposable latte cups in the Yarra.
Having backup diesel is so wasteful, just run the generators instead of the renewables and get use out of what you buy.
50
People need to tell thier mates about this so the word gets out.
You can get through to the younger ones by telling them the mobile network wont run due to lack of power…you watch thier eyes go wide…its fun but true. Backup batteries in the phone towers onky kast for so lobg….
70
no price is too high when you are “saving the planet”
“onky kast for so lobg” funny, I read that with the right meaning first time. I wonder if we will have AI one day to correct spelling checkers, then machine to machine flame wars about pedantry.
30
Its easy…i have fat fingers and get sick of typing stuff into screens, so if ive typed it wrobg i dont care any more….you’ ll work it out… 🙂
10
IF.
If the new PM won’t scrap Renewables Subsidies.
If they will not exit the Paris accord.
If they keep pretending that Man Made Global Warming is true.
If They Fail to Restructure bother the Scam Electricity “Market” and the collapsing Electricity Generation System.
Then, We Must Scrap Them at the next Election.
The days of pretend, expensive electricity Must End.
KK.
602
I’m with KK.
These two numpties are mindless groupies of the UN, not leaders.
Here’s a clue.
We know drought is their priority.
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When not waving chunks of coal around in parliament, Morrison’s position on investment in new coal plants has been pretty clear:
it won’t bring down prices, probably doesn’t make much sense.
“In a speech to the Australian Industry Group in Adelaide, the treasurer, Scott Morrison, spelt out the scepticism. He stressed the Coalition’s “resource and technology-agnostic” energy policy and said the government would welcome investment in HELE coal plants but added: “Let’s also be real about it.”
read on: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/aug/24/coal-in-decline-an-energy-industry-on-life-support
160
That’s the background we are interested in.
KK
100
Here is one from Rowan Dean of Outsiders:
Choosing between Peter Dutton and Scott Morrison as to whom should lead the Liberal party is the most significant decision that most Liberal MPs will make during their entire term in office.
For they are determining the future of their party as a viable political entity.
Should they elect Peter Dutton to replace Malcolm Turnbull, they will be giving they party the chance to be the dominant political force over the coming decade.
Should they elect Scott Morrison, they will have driven the final stake through its heart, the stake that Malcolm Turnbull so accurately and devastatingly has lined up.
And Mr Turnbull has even handed them the hammer – its name is ScoMo.
23 Aug, 2018: https://www.spectator.com.au/2018/08/a-fight-for-the-heart-and-soul-of-the-liberal-party/
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If we are to get used to ‘ScoMo’ over the next few months it’s perhaps just as well that Peter Dutton didn’t win.
20
I’ve been a primary producer almost all of my life running sheep/cattle and can say that most of our ilk just get on with it;no complaining or seeking sympathy from others.We have a drought – a bad one,but you have to take stock of the situation and adjust. A mendicant position is taken where you have this nonsense of farmers subsisting on packet noodles.What rot.Sometimes you gotta pull your head in when it gets tough.You adjust. A farmer after all is just a Man out standing in his field.
211
10000% agree.
This greenie NUTJOB Josh Frydenberg still has infulence.
So I don’t hold out any hope that there will be any common sense come out of all this.
http://pickeringpost.com/story/it-will-only-be-a-little-baby-carbon-tax/8441
152
Never trust the Ashkenazi.
35
That’s a rather antisemitic comment “glen Michel”.
20
Frydenberg has been moved into a portfolio that is immensely important and yet more constrictive of the damage that he can cause. I think Treasurer isn’t too bad a spot for him vs Energy and Environment.
And the 2 replacements (since Energy and Environment have been split) are far more appreciative of the economic realities that are within their responsibilities.
So far, ScoMo is off to a decent start and Julie Bishop’s resignation has made it even better.
10
KK if we scrap the LNP at the next election we are assured of even worse governance from Labor particularly on more renewables. They just love em. And they believe in CO2 and Accords.
50
True.
00
The trouble is that the greens control the labor party. They are adamant about turning Australia back to the 1850s. If we vote the LNP out, life would get much, much, worse.
60
So its time time to turn at your local members office and demand they adhere to science and ignore the paris sc@m.
00
40 °C eh? Let me see, a quick calculation makes that 104 °F, standard fare for summers in Arizona, just to name one place where the grid has not failed because of a hot day. The day I arrived there it was about 5:00 PM and the thermometer at my motel read 117. It was still above 100 when I awoke the next morning and went clesr up to 120. Degrees F of course, I wouldn’t want to mislead any ignorant readers.
But Jo doesn’t have any ignorant readers, right? So who is fooling whom? Or trying to.
What would even fail? Maybe a transformer. But they aren’t failing st a rate that alarms anyone, not even in Phoenix. What could cause a transformer to fail? The tract I live in was built in 1961 and ’62 and there are still original transformers on many poles. Some of them have their internal potting material leaking out from underneath the lid and it’s running down the outside. This doesn’t seem to bother Edison a bit. I see one from my kitchen window any time I’m looking out that window.
Interestingly, as soon as I installed air conditioning in 1998 it wasn’t very long until they put in a new larger transformer. I drove home from work one day and parked in the driveway as I usually did and suddenly a very bright reflection was in my face…just the right time of day for the shiny new transformer to hit me with the setting sun behind me before I could get out of the car. Otherwise I would never have noticed it. They apparently managed the swap without interrupting my power or I would have noticed that.
And larger means more power handling capacity. So I cost Edison some money. Their problem, not mine.
What the heck do they think is going to fail in 40 degree heat? Oh! I know, it’s their carefully set up scare campaign that will fizzle out and fail if they don’t keep everyone afraid of some new bogyman.
231
Not quite true, Roy, but we’ll take it in the spirit you mean it :-).
There are a few *SFTs who bounce up whenever a main post contains some Troll Food™ such as “ higher temperatures” and on occasions “sea level rise”.
Professor de Havilland, as but one example, provides endless hours of amusement to those two baits.
* SFT = Semi-Feral Troll
102
Roy
They are not concerned about equipment failure as such although that is possible. There is not enough conventional electricity generating capacity left since the Hazelwood power plant, in Victoria, and SA’s last coal-fired plant closed down to manage the load. In very hot conditions there is a very good chance that the winds will be light to nonexistent. Therefore, wind generated electricity will be minimal at best and result in a shortfall, not enough to provide electricity for all users.
A stationary high, can last a week or more, can result in hot conditions with no or little wind in the summer. In the UK they have on many occasions, experienced a week or more of stationary high with minimal wind generated electricity. I have read that they have had several days of little or no wind generate electricity just recently.
Basically, the problem is relying on intermittent sources without sufficient reliable backup.
The best option is to cease subsidising the unreliables and build new reliable coal-fired capacity.
John
120
Or the opposite. Victoria’s heat is usually caused by the naughty north wind. Often it blows well above the tolerance of the turbines. In fact, it can be like a blow torch. Same outcome, of course: no power from the wind turbines. Pretty much what happened in SA in 2016.
51
Aah then, the truth wins out in the end and they dodge to avoid admitting they didn’t plan a head. I remember a poster on someone’s office wall years ago that said, “Plan a head. Someday you may need a head,” and I’ve been saying it ever since because so many fall so easily into that nich,
50
Coal fired generation units failures only matter when you cull the numbers so much that you remove redundancy and finally, finally realise how dependent you are on them.
40
Also add Graeme No.3’s observation that there are temperature limits above which the wind turbines are forbidden to operate due to fire risk. I think 38 deg C was the limit.
Please correct me if my memory is incorrect, Graeme No.3
10
Analitik:
Either 38℃ or 40℃. There are 2 problems, the major one is fire from the lubrication oil (or more likely from breakdown products which being more volatile are the likely starter), the second is the computer controller(s) in the nacelle.
The number of fires in turbines is obvious even in countries with lower temperatures than Australia. And while the nacelle is high up and supposedly open to wind, it is a semi-enclosed volume with lots of heat generation inside.
00
What will fail is there will not be enough generating capacity when peak demand occurs. Therefore will require load shedding. A foreseeable and manufactured crisis.
All part of the green blob agenda to send us back to the dark ages.
60
We can have large high pressure regions sit at the latitude of Adelaide and take a week to cross to the east. During that time wind does not do much.
Conditions are not quite as bad next week but this is the beginning of the high pressure regions moving south of the continent after they drifted further north for the winter.
http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/charts/4day_col.shtml
I recall June this year has a long spell of about 10 days without much wind.
https://anero.id/energy/wind-energy/2018/june
Hot weather in southern Australia tends to align with light northerlies that occurs after the high pressure passes to the east. Stinking hot weather is usually associated with strong northerlies. That can cause very low humidity with high prospect of severe wild fires. The worst conditions are from January through to March.
Hot weather means air-conditioners cranking and the wind may not be blowing hard enough to keep the air-cons running. That is gradually being recognised as a problem by our grid operator. They have some perception that there will always be wind somewhere. Their models are based on the wind being at 85% of the average value at the same time over the last 5 years. It boils down to the wind always reliably delivers 24% of nameplate:
Sadly the wind is quite often a lot less than 24% of capacity and often more than 24% of capacity meaning the running reserve of dispatchable generation is higher than it should be. This is just another cost of intermittency that few recognise.
I think we will go a lot further into the abyss before the price and un reliability of electricity supply tips the scales away from so-called low cost intermittents.
130
Jo,
I was not yelling at the readers I just emphasising the ABC’s visual alarmist hysterical yelling with its Goebbelized temperature maps. Just trying to make my point.
Also sorry about the doubling up, not sure what happened there. The response time is slow I notice when I press “Post Comment” so it may be just the browser or server getting confused.
122
Just checking if it’s possible to post below here: (Komrade Kuma / August 25, 2018 at 6:14 am)
00
Yours is #68, below Komrade’s at #67 according to my display.
10
As a business model the Victorian / South Australia method is effective. Build a system based on renewables, which pushes prices up. Make electricity so expensive so all manufacturing and other energy intensive companies go out of business. Cuts a major source of demand , no need for load shedding. Unfortunately it leaves all those selfish consumers who want to use air conditioners. Don’t they realise that they are killing not only the next generation but all generations after that.
210
Of course they realise it. That is there agenda.
70
Yes, Agenda 2030
https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/post2015/transformingourworld
00
So in 1851 when the wind was blasting off the dry centre and the shade temp in Melbourne at 11AM was 47C – causing the world’s all-time biggest burn when a quarter of Victoria blazed – it was merely “hot”.
Now 40C is an “extreme” which might be a “catalyst” for something called “load shedding”. This is due to a phenomenon called “declining PV contribution” which seems somehow related to the phenomenon known as sunset…but that’s probably simplistic.
I really need an updated Newspeak Dictionary.
552
Hey, red-thumber GettUppy guy…Can I borrow your Newspeak Dictionary? You’ve probably got the latest edition.
182
Mapped: The world’s coal power plants …
https://www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worlds-coal-power-plants
160
‘Germany’s states are upping pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel to keep coal-fired power for as long as 30 years as the nation approaches a deadline for setting an exit date from the fossil fuel.’
GWPF
240
They need an exit date for Merkel.
70
That graphic is out of date. It shows a coal plant operating in Adelaide, which we know has already been demolished. Otherwise, very good.
10
Our Victorian Labor Premier has now begun to offer two taxpayer subsidised initiatives to assist homeowners with increasing energy bills. One is an upfront grant of $4500 for the installation of solar panels, to be repaid over four years interest free and the the other is (I think) a further $1000 grant for the installation of solar hot water systems.This is on top of a $50 cheque for simply having a look at the government energy provider website.
Now of course these grants won’t affect current prices of solar panel or hot water system installation, as no supplier is going to take advantage of these grants to increase prices, just like no builder increased building costs for the first home buyers grants etc. I wish money as so freely available to me to splurge wherever I wanted.
180
Do you remember Peter Garret?
10
The singing skeleton? Yes.
30
Isn’t it great what a politician can do, spending other people’s (ie taxpayer’s) money?
00
In Jan, 1908, Melbourne had five consecutive days of +40C. Imagine the panic if that happened this summer.
140
Its all the fault of evil coal
https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_5826032657001
120
I watched the same thing on TV news. They had the gall to report that 6 power plants had been partially inoperative at the time of the disruptions last month. It is beyond parody when the discussion has turned completely on its head to describe coal-powered electicity as “unreliable” and the cause of blackouts. The world has gone completely mad.
And meanwhile the Liberal Party vote Josh Frydenberg to deputy leader. God help us.
300
Josh Frydenberg greenie nutjob leftist traitor…….
RIP LIBERAL PARTY!
151
I had a greenie co worker tell me that coal pkants are unreluable, i all but told him was an ignorant fool, and as an Elec Eng that i could guarantee him that coal pkants get rebuilt all the time. Then i turned on an electric blow heater in the office to rub it in…he almost lost the plot……
These peopke are idiots. I dont argue with them any more, but rather ask questions that expose thier rank ignorance. They leave me alone eventually or leave with thier tail between thier legs. I have no patience for idiots, educated ones or otherwise……its time to mock them in public, so peopke can see their propaganda is just that…
30
The more blackouts (and brownouts) the better.
It’s about the only thing that will correctly focus people as to what the real problem is.
The CO2 horsesh*t has to stop.
Is “blackout” still politically correct?
252
toorightmate @ #14 asked:
Dunno. You could try:
An Unexpected Group of Multiple Events of Non-terminal Transients
or AUGMENTs. Sufficiently obscure?
100
You win today’s CEFORCED Triple A (Augmunted Acronym Award) in dishonour of C.U.T. Sweden’s Centre for Studies of Climate Change De-river-in-Egypt-ism, which offers a paper in one-eyed brainwashing, doublespeak gobbledegook, and inventing negative D-minus acronyms. Yours, on the other hand, sophocles, is outstanding.
80
Must be just as racist as whiteout for a snowstorm I guess.
101
It is perfectly acceptable in North Korea. So why not here?
Aren’t they our new benchmark?
40
Yes, south australia has the international space station confused for a while when they had thier glorious Soviet blackout…
00
Scotty and Joshy liked the NEG and the GREAT BARRIER REEF FOUNDATION PLAY MONEY,.
THEY DIDN’t want a ROYAL COMMISSION into their mates BANKING behaviour. They believe in the GLOBAL WARMING BULLSHIT.
In my opinion, Malcolm’s little bum buddies will continue the destruction under re- named policies with the same outcome.
WE NEED A TRUE TRUMP. Leader who does what he promises.
311
RIP LIBERAL PARTY UNDER THESE TWO TURNCOAT CLONES……….
130
Give ScoMo a chance – his appointments for Energy and Environment are extremely promising signs.
Frydenberg is a lost cause but somewhat neutralised in Treasury. Bishop has quit which shows she doesn’t see ScoMo in the same light as Turncoat.
20
There is something odd about the Energy Security Board‘s modelling of the 2018/19 electricity market in Victoria (refer their spreadsheet with assumptions and forecasts), before any NEG is implemented.
Firstly the good news – apparently Vic is going to enjoy a reduction in average wholesale electricity prices from $96/MWhr in 2017/18 to $81/MWhr in 2018/19.
The odd thing is the change in the generation mix to deliver 44.9 TWhr in total (that’s 5,100 MW on average). No surprise about the increase in solar (incl rooftop) from 1.5 to 2.6 TWhr and wind from 2.6 to 4.0 TWhr. And brown coal delivers 34.3 TWhr. But natural gas is forecast to drop from 2.7 TWhr to only 0.5 TWhr, with an increase of 1.0 TWhr in hydro. Now as hydro and gas are the normal ways to cover peak evening demand in summer of 9,000 MW, perhaps that explains the increased risk of blackouts? Are some of the gas generators going to shutdown? Vic has about 2,000 MW of gas-fired generators, but according to ESB’s forecast their use will drop from 300 MW to only 60 MW. Is that economic?
To meet that peak evening summer demand of 9,000 MW, Vic has about 4,000 MW of brown coal, 2,000 MW of gas, 2,000 MW of hydro, but that’s only 8,000 MW. Add 500 MW from Tas, perhaps a little from NSW, and then …. let’s hope the wind is blowing. Hmmm, missing that 1,600 MW from Hazelwood? Any hickups on interconnectors or failures of key units, and blackouts or brownouts are inevitable. Portland aluminium smelter consumes about 500 MW – curtail? Shutdown more industry? “AEMO is seeking tenders for the provision of long notice reserve for summer 2018/19 in Victoria and South Australia (combined requirement), under the Reliability and Emergency Reserve Trader (RERT) provisions. This invitation to tender closes on 4.00 pm, 20 August 2018”.
Oh wait, didn’t the Vic government indicate they were going to install 100 MW of diesel generators, and 50 MW of batteries? And of course unreliable coal will be blamed, we need more subsidies for solar.
210
Victoria……….
At least 250,000 homes to suffer regular three-hour BLACKOUTS this summer because of ‘extreme heatwaves’ – and the closure of coal power stations
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6093159/250-000-homes-suffer-regular-summer-blackouts-extreme-heatwaves.html
Serves them right for closing Hazelwood !!
enjoy you idiots…..
130
Notice in the stock picture of Hazelwood they have smoke coming out of one stack to falsely give the impression this is normal operation. In fact, smoke would only come out during the start up process.
60
My thoughts exactly…..
10
Pickering’s take on morrison……….
http://pickeringpost.com/story/ideologically-malleable-maybe/8492
I’m not so optimistic!
60
Interesting note about this Frydenberg character……..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josh_Frydenberg
“In 2005 he took up a position as a Director of Global Banking with Deutsche Bank in the company’s Melbourne office.[4]”
“Deutsche Bank” are great supporters of carbon trading!
150
The plot is getting more substance by the day.
60
The former Director of Global Banking for Deutsche has been our Minister for the Environment and Energy. Yep. Global Banking. For DB.
Despite some jailings a few years back over carbon trading fiddles Deutsche still hasn’t lost its deep concern for sustainablility. https://www.db.com/cr/en/concrete-sustainable-large-scale-projects.htm
“…no more than one third of proven fossil fuel reserves can be used if global warming is to be limited to 2˚C.” Can you guess which fossil fuel and whose fossil fuel they might be talking about? (But only if it hasn’t taken a boat trip to Asia!)
Director of Global Banking, eh? You know, if someone’s title is Poker of Eyes with Burnt Sticks and that person then pokes you in the eye with a burnt stick…you really shouldn’t be surprised.
80
As the AEMO has pointed out, even if there is not a blackout in Victoria this summer, the cost of emergency gas power is already estimated at $300Million. That’s $300million we never had to spend before with Hazelwood operating. Even this is with emergency shutdown of smelters and other big electricity users, subsidies to pay factories not to work and potentially massive fines for anyone who keeps working. This is what you get in a Marxist state like Victoria.
There was no problem with cheap, adequate electricity before. It is all due to government intervention to force us to move to wind and solar, no matter how crazy that is.
South Australia at least are building their own big power plant just to supply the government offices with power in case of a blackout. The epitome of ‘I’m all right Jack’ politics.
Governments should get out of our pockets and our power bills. Let the governments use only wind and solar. See how they like it.
180
AEMO made the same prediction about blackout risk for Victoria last year.
September 2017
“The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) says the South Australian Government’s energy plan will help alleviate the risk of unplanned blackouts this summer, but is warning the risk of such blackouts is significantly higher across the border in Victoria.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-06/aemo-forecast-mixed-blackout-risk-for-south-australia-victoria/8875798
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The Key
http://joannenova.com.au/2018/08/who-will-be-our-pm-tomorrow-someone-politically-correct-or-a-leader-of-free-men/#comment-2036793
KK
50
I for one am looking forward to massive, damaging blackouts, not only in Victoriastan but Australia-wide. It is the ONLY thing that MIGHT wake up the sheeple and politicians and make them understand the insanity of unreliables.
202
Totally agree. It is the only way they will open their eyes.
50
Got the generator, got the switch wired in last season. Frankly Scarlett I dont give a damn, just feel sorry for the trusting masses that get caught out. However I think it is what needs to happen, rather than papering over the cracks.
40
Extreem temperatures are nothing to do with any warming (dont tell a warmist) they are due to trapped high pressure systems and dry air, therefore under gas laws of heat transfer will heat up.
90
“Will the new PM, Scott Morrison, be able to solve this problem? Thousands of engineers can.” – nope. Morrison with new treasurer, climate change oficiando, Freydenberg will not change course. the LNP is doomed and so is Oz when Labor/Green alliance takes over.
100
The combined population of China and India produce 40% more CO2 than all of Australia…people..industry…whiteants combined!
788.4Mt to 539Mt…that is just people…living…producing…reproducing. One big con! The other big con is the ability to have wind/solar competing as baseload by reducing the bid time to just five minutes. Dispatchable means KNOWING the electricity will be there in five minutes five hours, five days,five weeks, five years from now. How can you run industry unless you have surety of supply.
140
There is a lot of yap about the reliability of ageing coal-fired power stations.
In my experience, a WELL MAINTAINED old plant is more reliable than a brand new plant – specially the boiler and turbine technologies.
160
I dont hear anyone commenting on “ageing” Hydro electricity plants…..always, only, coal fired..!
Today I visited one on the Sth Island, NZ, that was 56yrs old …built in 1962 and still producing 55mw..
The Waitaki hydro scheme ..consisting of 8 power stations from Lake Tekapo to Lake Waitaki…unbelievable sight.
Granted NZ has more snow melt….but they also have more foresight, less population, less tax money and fewer Greens !
Nothing stopping us harnessing the monsoon rains up North !
What a backwater Australia is turning into !
140
Hydro is actually , to use the term ‘green’ as it totally relies on the water cycle. Also those generators in the hydro stations are very robust. And for MW/kg Copper are much more efficient than any wind-turbine. Karapiro has been going for years too. Pity NZ dint fix up the steam leaks in Waitaki. Geothermal can work if you fix it rather than play experiments.
80
And the Greenie don’t even realise it produces more CO2 per megawatt-hour than an fossil fueled plant!
10
I believe Australia’s oldest working hydro is the Rubicon Hydroelectric Scheme in Victoriastan. It produces 13MW and was completed in 1929. I wrote an article about it:
http://www.siliconchip.com.au/Issue/2013/February/The+Historic+Rubicon+Hydroelectric+Scheme
120
Tgey could emulate Snowy 2 by pumping some of that water back uphill with an hydraulic ram – no electricity required (though inbuilt inefficiencies)
30
It’s time I paid a visit, seeing as how it’s fairly local!
We did visit the one near Mt Beauty quite a long time ago. That was the time it snowed up at Pretty Valley a week before Christmas and we had to look for blankets at the op shop in Mt Beauty!
20
I read your article a while back David M.
10
Annie, here is my GPS log from when I did a walk there recently. It’s about 16km. The walk down the penstock at the end is quite tough.
https://www.facebook.com/740348081/posts/10157486185028082/
10
600 meters of head produces 30 megwatts with very little flow at Cobb.Built in wartime.
10
just a pity most of the Australian people dont live up North. Transmission potential is finite and limited.
10
I suggest everyone, not just those in Victoria, produce a “go bag” (aka a bug-out bag) and learn about other short and longer term emergency supplies. For example, . . .
We fill 2 litre bottles with filtered water and put these in our freezers. We have a couple of those.
When the power goes off (not often here, and not long) the strategy is to keep the lid closed.
Well, that and eating the ice cream.
A small chest freezer is cheaper than losing expensive food.
We can also cook with wood, charcoal, or propane.
We also have about 200 to 300 L of less clean water stored for other uses, say flushing, cleaning, washing. (If our power goes off, our pump won’t work.) I’ve seen news reports of people filling every cup, bowl, and drinking glass with tap water in the expectation of a coming storm. That’s nuts.
There is much info about such things on the web. Read and do what fits your situation to protect your family.
Don’t wait until the store shelves are empty. Most do.
130
The greens and the labor party have an ultimate goal of converting all of Australia’s power generation to renewables backed by batteries.
Assuming this to be possible, how much battery capacity would be needed to cover for the odd widespread rain, when the continent is covered by one of those very slow-moving highs when there is little or no wind (a not too infrequent set of circumstances). Let’s assume that sufficient battery capacity to cover 24 hours of electricity demand would be enough (there are plenty of people who consider that a full week of backup would be needed to prevent blackouts!!)
The $100million set of batteries installed in South Australia has a capacity of about 129 MWhrs enough to power SA for 3.8 minutes, or Australia for about 16 seconds, in the event no power was available from other sources (totally renewable if the greens have their wish). It’s a very easy calculation to show that batteries of the same technology as installed in SA would cost about $38 billion to cover SA’s needs for 24 hours, or about $550 billion to cover Australia’s.
Batteries have a rather limited life (6-7years?) after which they need to be disposed of and replaced. The mind boggles at the problems and cost of disposal and replacement every, say seven years. It would have to be enormous.
How much modern coal-fired power could be constructed for. $550 billion? A recent costing by engineers Gutheridge Haskins and Davey put the cost of a 1000MW HELE coal-fired station at $2.2billion. At this amount the $550billion would build 250 000 MW of capacity. Clearly, since the country’s total maximum power demand requires around 30000 MW of capacity to be online, much less than 250000 MW of capacity would be needed. Allowing for spare capacity and shutdown time for periodic maintenance, around 40000MW should be ample. This capacity could be built for about $90billion and would replace ALL current capacity in the whole of the country. It would have a useful life of around 50 years and operate at a capacity factor of 75-85% rain, hail wind or shine. It would be totally reliable!
Think of this. $90 billion would ensure that Australia has low-cost, reliable, dispatchable electric power for the next 50 years, at a cost not much greater (probably less) than the cost of the French diesel submarine contract which IMO was entered into for the sole purpose of shoring up voter support for Christopher Pyne.
190
If politicians who purport to know what’s best for us and the country can’t be bothered to find out/accept advice on these figures and commonsense facts, they are guilty of wilful ignorance. There is no getting away from it.
‘Their’ ABC and Fauxfacts need a metphorical bomb under them; I’m sick of all the untruths.
122
Sorry, metaphorical.
12
My mind must be getting attuned to predictive text – I read through your missed letter.
Cheers,
Dave B
30
David, your calculation appears is most interesting. It’s a lot of money!
It’s a very simple calculation and I wonder why no one has done it before.
We should confront our politicians with such a calculation.
As you rightly point out this amount of storage would only cover one day.
Elon Musk would be able to retire – perhaps not!
By contrast if we had suitable coal fired power right up the East coast of Australia then we wouldn’t require any storage capacity at all, nor any interconnectors.
Cheapest electricity on the planet.
Regards GeoffW
80
I have done similar estimates several times , both here and on other forums, in attempting to show the total impracticality of high % of wind and solar in a grid system.
But 24 hrs is not enough to ensure continuity of supply…infact, no amount is a guarantee, ..henc the total impracticality of batteries..or pumped hydro etc, as a solution.
The only realistic answer is 100% capacity back up using coal, gas, or Nuclear power !
……And then the whole concept becomes rediculous…..
…but that is exactly where SA, and Germany find themselves currently….fully duplicated generation capacity in RE and Fossil fuels.
And they wonder why the power prices are so high
Its sad that more decision makers cannot see the obvious flaws in the Solar/Wind ideology.
110
..sorry, i intended to add that the actual cost of the Tesla battery in SA was nearer to $45m US ..(they are usd$350k per MWh, ). But that is largely academic, since the scale of a “National Back Up Battery , even for 24 hrs , of 720 GWh….would require a 100% dedicated production run of over 14 years from Teslas Mega battery factory
..or only 7 years if the entire lithium battery manufacturing capacity of the world was co opted to the task !!!
120
🙂
40
Are the even enough economically recoverable reserves of lithium in the world to build such a monstrous battery?
20
there not the.
00
I still believe that the SA battery was sold to SA at well under its actual cost. Forbes said that they believed the true cost of these installations would be closer to $150m.
00
Up until last year, Tesla had a cost calculator tool on their site for the commercial PowerPack units.
One large projet of 20+ MW ws costed at us$350,000 per MWh fully installed.
Making the cost us$35m,..or $45-50m Au.
But also, for the SA “Big Battery”, Musk offered to meet half the cost as it was a “first time” experimental installation for Tesla and developmental to some extent..
But as you say, details of the actual costs were never made public.
10
Then factor in the cobalt requirement (which is pretty much always ignored by all the li-ion battery proponents)
20
David Wood:
Sorry, but I disagree. The capaity of the “Big Battery” is 100MW which it can discharge at a rate of 129MWh (i.e. 100 in 46.5 seconds).
Secondly, the big trouble for SA will come in a prolonged hot spell as the NW winds blow heat from the interior over Adelaide and surrounds where the vast proportion of the population live. Peak demand rises to 2800-3000MW (it used to be 3200-3300MW but industry losses have reduced demand).
So for 3 days you would need 24*60*3*3000 = 12,960,000 MWh. With the new “big Battery” costing $50 million (estimate as we, the taxpayers, aren’t allowed to see the cost) for 100MWh = $6,480,000 million for SA for 3 days. At SA’s 6.5% of the total demand that gives a cost foe enough backup for Australia of $99,692.3 billion. DO CHECK THIS AS IT MAKES BATTERIES RIDICULOUS.
A modern HELE station cost about $A2.8 billion for 1000MW as Vietnam has contracted for 3 from different suppliers on green field sites. Up-grading our existing sites should be less, but with local Unions and Government public servants I would allow $A4.5 billion for each, or $A90 billion for 20 new HELE stations. These would last 50 years as you say, generate electricity at less than the current wholesale rate in Qld of $A70-75 per MWh and cut CO2 emissions by 22-25% (whether necessary or not).
100
> Sorry, but I disagree. The capaity of the “Big Battery” is 100MW which it can discharge at a rate of 129MWh (i.e. 100 in 46.5 seconds).
If you’re going to disagree,you should at least understand the units you are talking about.
100MW capacity and a rate of 129MWh are both incorrect and your 46.5 seconds is also wrong
Should that perhaps be 100MWh discharged at a rate of 129MW? In which case, the capacity would be discharged in 46.5 minutes, not seconds.
41
Whoops my mistake. And yes, I understand it would wreck the battery if fully discharged at that rate. It was more the huge cost that I was trying to draw attention to.
40
100MW max output with 129MWh storage => ~77 minutes output at max rate if fully charged (and you wanted to stuff the cells in short order).
https://hornsdalepowerreserve.com.au/
00
Graeme,
Thanks for your comment.
I’m a chemical engineer with only a smattering of Elec. Eng. from graduate days (about 60 years ago) so I could well be wrong. However I understand that a battery has only storage capacity, not continuous production capacity, so it is proper to talk of a battery with a storage capacity of 129 MWh rather than having a capacity of 100MW. Once the 129 MWh is discharged the battery should be relatively useless until it is recharged, which would not be possible if there is no generating capacity available. As to the cost of the SA battery I have no knowledge other than it was often called a $100 million battery in the MSM. Whether one should give any credence to reports in the MSM is another matter.
90
Just imagine the array of batteries required at QAL if QAL was to be solar/wind powered.
20
In practice, the SA battery seems to operate by discharging at a rate of about 30 MW for about 10-20 minutes at a time. As I understand it, a capacity of 129 MWhr means that if it was fully charged, it could deliver 30 MW for about 4 hours, or various combinations up to its capacity of 129 MWhr.
20
Robber,
it is constrained by SA Govt. rules to 30% discharge. It does this quite rapidly and the operators are claiming they should be paid special rates for “stabilising the grid”.
Basically it stores some energy when the wind blows (and the available selling price is low) and sells when the price is high. There have been claims of it making $1 million in a day, but that would require a selling price over $6,700 for 30 MW over 5 minutes. SA has been plagued by short time peaks above that but details are ‘commercially confidential” and whether that discharge rate is possible I leave to others more expert.
20
Basically the battery is being used to make money from arbitrage in the electricity market. It otherwise has no useful function.
30
Frequency Control Ancillary Services is its normal operation (keeping frequency stable within the normal operating band of 49.85Hz to 50.15Hz) and 70% of stored capacity is allowed to be used for this. So the guaranteed amount available to “save the grid” is only 38.7MWh which would last 23 minutes at full output if the battery was at its minimum storage due to FCAS usage and at most, it would last 77 minutes if FCAS usage had it fully charged.
https://www.aemo.com.au/-/media/Files/PDF/Guide-to-Ancillary-Services-in-the-National-Electricity-Market.pdf
10
David, the battery cells have a maximum charge/discharge rate and these are wired in parallel into 16 pods which feed the inverters which are also paralleled into packs. And then the packs are arranged in series/parallel to provide the output as required – this is the ‘scalable’ element in the Tesla Powerpack deployment. And then all of this would hide behind a transformer
https://www.tesla.com/en_AU/powerpack
10
The economic point for an all solar plus battery supplying southern and eastern Australia aligns with about 48 hours of storage. That capacity can be reduced to a lower value by adding on-demand generation such as fossil fuel or hydro.
Some lithium battery suppliers are offering 10 year guarantee. AEMO used 12 years life for the ISP financial modelling.
Lithium is yet to prove its calendar life capabilities however if they can match Nickel-Cadmium then they could do better than 12 years. I have been told by a Toyota service manager that some 2000 vintage Prius still have the original battery. This is a story on a Prius Taxi:
https://www.hybridcars.com/toyota-prius-taxi-running-strong-with-600000-miles-and-original-battery/
The latest Prius use lithium batteries and I expect Toyota would have done comprehensive accelerated life testing before releasing.
30
I know courier vehicles that have done 1,000,000kms , but most dont.
Be interested in what the population typically achieves, there are always high/low performing outliers.
20
***as with much of the MSM, 45-40 was a devastating blow to Dutton, but 45-40 in favour of a spill showed there was still plenty of support for PM Turnbull!
TWEET: Annabel Crabb, ABC: Wow. Spill vote margin 45-40 according to @abcnews. That’s amazingly tight – 40 people voted to keep Malcolm Turnbull.
reply: Trent Brown, ARC DECRA Fellow at @unimelb interested in sustainability, urbanisation, rural development and agrarian change, Melbourne:
Amazing 40 voted to keep their most popular leader and the only one capable of representing the political centre?
24 Aug: RenewEconomy: “Scoal-Mo” as PM. What does that mean for climate and energy policy?
by Giles Parkinson & Sophie Vorrath
It says something about the state of Australia’s politics that the new prime minister, the man who brandished a lump of coal in parliament, is considered a moderate, at least in comparison to the forces he beat to the job…
The vote on Friday – 45-40 in favour of Morrison – ***is a devastating blow to the conservative forces led by Tony Abbott who managed to tear down Malcolm Turnbull, largely because they never liked him, and found a point of argument on climate and energy…
That’s a relief for the renewable energy industry in Australia – because it is clear that Dutton may have led Australia out of the Paris climate agreement and even brought renewable energy schemes to a crashing halt.
But it may not be cause for celebration…READ ALL
https://reneweconomy.com.au/scoal-mo-as-pm-what-does-that-mean-for-climate-and-energy-policy-26556/
24 Aug: RenewEconomy: Vale Malcolm Turnbull: Man who saw the future and feigned to stop it
by Giles Parkinson
Well, he sure had me fooled. And many others.
I’m really embarrassed to admit this, but when Christine Milne resigned as leader of The Greens, I (half jokingly) Tweeted that maybe they should pick then Liberal back-bencher Malcolm Turnbull to replace her. Apologies to the excellent Richard di Natale, Milne, the Greens and everyone else.
What inspired me to suggest something like that? Like many others, I had been seduced by the idea that Turnbull offered a path of intelligent, informed debate about the most intractable policy issue gripping the country – emissions and energy. And was capable of Doing Something.
After all, we had heard Turnbull speak at the launch of the Beyond Zero Emissions 100 per cent renewable energy plan in 2010.
“This is a fantastic piece of work,” Turnbull said, agreeing that electricity had to be zero emissions by 2050 at the latest. (You can find the speech here or watch the video below.)…
There is no one on the conservative side of politics who can, or will, say the obvious: that Australia can reduce its emissions and can reduce its prices, all the while maintaining system security. And you do that by embracing the clean energy transition and managing the future…
https://reneweconomy.com.au/vale-malcolm-turnbull-man-who-saw-the-future-and-feigned-to-stop-it-58862/
00
Slightly off topic;
I have just received electricty bill from Origin for the last 89 days.
My consumption was 1531 kWh. Origin say that my indicative greenhouse gas emissions for this period was 1.5 tonnes. Sounds a lot to me.
Anyone like to comment on how that amount was calculated.
Regards GeoffW
40
Google says 2,460 kWh/ton of coal.
My last bill of 1085 kWhr reportedly generated 1.4 tonnes of emissions. But I guess that’s CO2 from Vic brown coal, so with a couple of oxygen atoms added it weghs a lot more than carbon.
40
Geoff Williams:
Which State are you in? NSW black coal is about 960kg CO2 per MWh or 1.47 tonnes for your consumption. If in Victoria the brown coal there is 1100 -1200 Kg per MWh (Hazelwood was highest at 1290) or 1.76 tonnes. Qld with the newest black coal fired is around 790Kg per MWh or 1.2 tonnes. Preumably you are in NSW with a small mixture of Qld. and Vic. and a small amount of renewables.
Black coal HELE at 700 would reduce your emissions to 1.0 tonnes or (at 800 for HELE brown coal) to 1.2 tonnes CO2.
Your consumption of 1531kWh in 89 days amounts to 17.2kWh per day, slightly less than the Australian average of 18kWh per day. Trees will love you.
60
Great reply Graeme, in fact I ‘got off my backside’ and looked it up on google. I found a site World Coal Association and it gave me the same data you have kindly done.
Regards GeoffW
30
Geoff, Robber, Graeme,
Don’t be hoodwinked or side-tracked.
The CO2 horsesh*t has to stop.
62
comment in moderation.
10
The first blackouts/load shedding of the season per AEMO:
At 1312 hrs 25/08/2018. Queensland separated from NSW region and South Australia separated from Victoria region.
South Australia operating in an Island. Queensland region operating in an island. NSW and Victoria remain connected.
The following transmission lines tripped out of service. All regions reconnected at 1420 hrs
8L and 8M Dumaresq to Bulli 330 kV Transmission line tripped out of service. Both lines in-service by 1433 hrs.
86 Armidale -Tamworth 330 kV transmission line tripped out of service. 86 Line remains out of service.
Indication of volume of load shed and in regions. NSW shed 800 MW. Victoria shed 280 MW. Tasmania shed 80 MW.
Load in Victoria restored 1400 hrs.
Industrial Load in the NSW region restored 1410 hrs. 1340 hrs other customer load permission to restore.
Load in Tasmania restored 1342 hrs.
Approximate total amount of generation tripped in each region. Nil generation observed to trip.
At 1337 hrs South Australia region synchronised with Victoria region.
At 1420 hrs Queensland region synchronised and NSW.
70
I’m wondering whether load shedding blackouts have happened much before in Victoria on a few of the hottest summer days.
For example in summer 2009 there were “massive blackouts”
https://www.smh.com.au/national/massive-power-blackout-hits-victoria-20090130-7twi.html
10
Jo,
would you be able to provide a link to the AEMO report which provides the 30% figure. I have a copy of the “2018 NEM Statement of Opportunities”, but don’t see it in there.
Thanks
00
I hope we get heat wave after heat wave after heat wave. I hope it’s 45 for days, weeks. I hope the lights go out, the a/c stops and people scream. We have put up with this sh$t for FAR too long.
Time’s up.
91
Is that why my computer seems to be living in a Wells novel?
00
No, that’s just Turnbull.
10
Great JoNova reference in Brietbart.
Another Greenie bites the dust.
Some great writing..
“Though Turnbull is a member of the Liberal party – Australia’s conservatives – his politics are very much at the squishier end of the spectrum. An arch-globalist, nicknamed the Honourable Member for Goldman Sachs (where he was a partner), Turnbull is fairly typical of the centrist, ideology-free conservatives who have tended to make the running in western politics in recent years. Indeed, when he first entered politics he seriously considered representing Australia’s Labor party (the socialists) rather than the Liberal party (the conservatives).”
50
Even a link back to this site!
61
There was a lovely little letter in the Oz last Thursday.
The author said M Turnbull reminded him of Christopher Columbus.
When he left, he didn’t know where he was going.
When he got there, he didn’t know where he was.
When he got back, he didn’t know where he had been.
50
You forgot the last line
“And he did it all on borrowed money”
And how about this as a CV to wow potential future business partners
“TURNBULL’S VENGEANCE”
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/turnbulls-vengeance/news-story/7c76203aa709ad7859eff8602a1ba1d6
30
Plus of course a wonderful piece about the new extreme socialist congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez..”‘Americans Are Dying’ from Global Warming”
and “Our children’s lives are on the line.”
It’s always this way with Socialists. No borders, save the polar bears, penguins and please oh please save the children. Forget the teenagers and adults, especially the worthless men.
It’s like Matilda in reverse. “They’re all mistakes, men! Filthy, nasty things. Glad I never was one.”
71
lengthy, detailed piece by –
David Leitch – Principal ITK • specialises in analysis of electricity, gas and decarbonisation
Formerly research analyst at UBS, JPMorgan and predecessor firms for 33 years (from author’s pdf for clean energy council)
24 Aug: RenewEconomy: AGL and Origin: Making a profit didn’t use to be a crime
by David Leitch
https://reneweconomy.com.au/agl-and-origin-making-a-profit-didnt-use-to-be-a-crime-77846/
10
Imagine how Renew would light up if the coal generators made bucannering profits during shortages
20
from cached versions:
25 Aug: EnergyVoice: Trade bodies hit out at UK Government as onshore wind farm numbers set to plummet
by David McPhee
New numbers provided by GlobalData on the wind turbine foundations market point directly to a drop off by more than half of new wind farms being built from 2018 to 2022.
Compared to data provided between 2012-2017, in which nearly 4,000 onshore units were built, the next four years will only see 1,080 wind turbine foundations constructed.
The alarming drop off in onshore wind foundations – and therefore new wind farms – is likely to be less severe in Scotland, however, trade body Scottish Renewables described it as a result of the UK Government’s decision to “lock onshore wind out of the energy market”.
A spokeswoman for GlobalData agreed that there was a direct correlation, adding: “the end of subsidies for onshore wind resulted in a drop in revenues for onshore wind foundations”…
Scottish Renewables senior policy manager, Fabrice Leveque, responded with dismay: …“The UK onshore wind industry is ready to deliver a strong pipeline of capacity to provide low-cost energy to Britain’s homes and businesses, employing tens of thousands of workers across the country, and to help the UK Government meet its industrial and clean growth ambitions.
“But this will only happen if Ministers urgently remove the block to allow our cheapest technologies to compete in Contracts for Difference power auctions.”…
RenewableUK’s head of external affairs, Luke Clark, added: “The Government’s current policy of excluding onshore wind from the energy market is having a serious impact on deployment and that’s hitting onshore wind supply chain companies up and down the country.
“The number of UK firms benefiting from multi-million pound contracts to supply onshore wind foundations and other infrastructure could be expanding rapidly, but under the current policy economic opportunities are being lost and consumers are being denied the benefits of the cheapest source of new power we have.”…
https://www.energyvoice.com/?p=180026
Edie.net: Sadiq Khan calls for rethink on solar subsidies closure
London mayor Sadiq Khan was written to the Government expressing his concerns that a decision to let financial solar incentives expire next year could create a “cliff edge” for the wider solar market
Khan penned a letter to Energy Minister Claire Perry, claiming he was “deeply concerned” that Government proposals to end the Feed-in Tariff (FiT) scheme once it expires in March 2019 would hamper his own efforts to boost deployment of solar technology in the capital.
Once the scheme expires, households will no longer be able to generate income by selling unused electricity sourced from solar back to the national grid. Khan believes that the decision could dissuade the public from investing in household arrays… cuts to the FiT scheme back in 2015 created a 75% fall in installations and Khan is concerned that expiring the scheme all together could have similar consequences…
Khan is aiming to install 2GW of solar in London by 2050, 100MW of which will be issued through various community programmes…
https://www.edie.net/news/11/Sadiq-Khan-calls-for-re-think-on-Feed-in-Tariff-closure/
10
23 Aug: S&P Global/Platts: Analysis: French nuclear outages support rally in European carbon prices
by Antoine Simon, Mario Perez
Extended nuclear outages in France coupled with above seasonally normal temperatures have brought power prices to hit record highs as lower French power exports pushed fossil fuel generation higher in neighbouring Spain and Italy.
Daily CCGT demand in August surged in Spain, France and Italy by 93%, 53% and 35% respectively to 25.72 million cu m/day, 8.99 million cu m/day, and 67.6 million cu m/day Tuesday, data from S&P Global Platts Analytics showed.
The French-Spanish power flow balance flipped from 22 GWh net exports from France August 20 to 4 GWh net imports into France August 22, Red Electrica data showed. France turned into a net importer as domestic nuclear reactor output was reduced due to unplanned outages…
A reduction of French electricity exports to Italy has compounded the impact of strong domestic demand in the last days and tightened the Italian power market, traders said. This has pushed gas-for-power demand to hit a 10-day high at 67.6 million cu m Monday, or approximately 404 GWh, according to Platts Analytics data.
The Spanish whole power price at the OMIE spot exchange settled for Wednesday delivery at Eur68.52/MWh — marking a year-to-date high — as low domestic wind output added pressure to the export pull to France. The spot contract was the highest since December 13, 2017…
Spanish gas-for-power demand was set to generate a total of 146 GWh or 26 million cu m/day Wednesday, the highest since August 6, amid low wind, lower French imports and a peak above seasonal temperatures.
Coal-fired generation was seen rising to 153 GWh Wednesday, also at the highest level since August 6.
Higher fossil fuel generation to offset an unexpected dip in French nuclear output over the last few days has contributed to stronger demand for carbon emission allowances under the European Trading System, with an impact on carbon prices…
EU emission credits have been seen rising sharply over the last few months, with one trader saying that “the news of the canceled German EUA auctions this winter has created tension.”
On August 14, Germany said that it would halt its CO2 auctions scheduled from November 14 — cutting 21.8 million mt — as it needs to reappoint the European Energy Exchange as the auctioning platform and update EU regulation…
https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/electric-power/082318-analysis-french-nuclear-outages-support-rally-in-european-carbon-prices
24 Aug: UK Independent: Scottish Power hikes gas and electricity bills for second time this year
The increase will affect one third of homes supplied by the company
by Caitlin Morrison
Scottish Power has announced its second bill increase in 2018, and said its standard variable domestic gas and electricity prices will go up from 8 October.
Prices will go up by an average of 3.7 per cent, or £46, on an annual basis.
The increase will affect one third of homes supplied by the company, about 900,000 households. The other homes supplied by Scottish Power will not be affected, the firm said…
The group has blamed rising wholesale costs for both hikes…
“More than two-thirds of our customers are on fixed-price products or other tariffs not impacted by this price change. Those customers affected by the price change will be contacted and offered the opportunity to move to a fixed-price tariff alternative and avoid this increase.”
Scottish Power joins British Gas and EDF in issuing a second bill increase this year.
Stephen Murray, energy expert at MoneySuperMarket, said: “This is the sixth month in a row when a Big Six supplier has announced a price rise, so we shouldn’t be surprised by today’s announcement.
“Traditionally these rises were always bunched together at the beginning or end of the year, but the changing nature of the wholesale market means the price of energy is going up all the time and suppliers now feel the need to reflect this in their bills.”…
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/scottish-power-bill-hike-gas-electricity-standard-variable-tariff-customers-a8506111.html
00
23 Aug: Science Mag: White House science nominee ducks chance to refute climate skeptic at Senate confirmation hearing
By Jeffrey Mervis
Kelvin Droegemeier got exactly one hardball question at today’s Senate hearing on his nomination to be director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). It came from Senator Ted Cruz (R–TX), who believes the planet is not warming and that climate change has been fabricated by those “who want to expand government control over the economy.”
“Are you familiar with the empirical data from satellite measurements that show no statistically significant warming over the past 18 years?” Cruz asked. And Droegemeier, a professor of meteorology at The University of Oklahoma in Norman and an expert on severe storm prediction, chose to sidestep the question.
“I’m familiar with some of those studies,” he replied. “But I don’t study climate.”
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/08/white-house-science-nominee-ducks-chance-refute-climate-skeptic-senate-confirmation
Conventional wisdom says Droegemeier’s decision not to offer any substantive response may be a good strategy for winning confirmation. But some climate scientists are disappointed Droegemeier didn’t defend the vast body of science that contradicts Cruz’s position on climate change. They also worry that his tepid answer signals that Droegemeier has decided to remain mum on an issue that pits most of the scientific community against President Donald Trump and his administration.
“It’s only one political data point, but it’s unfortunate,” says meteorologist David Titley, who rebutted an identical claim by Cruz when he testified at a December 2015 hearing Cruz chaired on “promoting open inquiry” on the topic. “Only time will tell how Kelvin will be on climate change,” says Titley, a professor at Pennsylvania State University in State College and the director of the Center for Solutions to Weather and Climate Risk there…
“Cruz was trying to imply that there is no warming,” says Andy Dressler, a climate scientist at Texas A&M University in College Station. “That’s not true, of course.”…
Titley says Cruz has “cherry-picked” the data by starting with 1998, when global temperatures were at a peak following a powerful El Niño season, and by suggesting those satellite measures are the only indicators of global warming. “The satellite data can be hard to interpret,” he acknowledges. “But the running trend from 30 to 40 years of satellite data is clear, and along with all the other indicators, the evidence [for warming temperatures] is overwhelming.”…
Dressler says no one should be surprised at how Droegemeier handled the question. “This administration was never going to pick someone like John Holdren [former President Barack Obama’s head of OSTP and science adviser] to be the president’s science adviser. They want someone who is going to toe the line” on climate policy…
Members from both parties said they thought Droegemeier was the right man for the job…
Judging from today’s hearing, the vote to send his nomination to the full Senate could be unanimous.
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/08/white-house-science-nominee-ducks-chance-refute-climate-skeptic-senate-confirmation
20
I thought the point of the pause/hiatus wasnt about warming or not. If the warmists trumpet CO2 as the big magic warming climate switch , and also trumpet that its continually passing unprecedented tipping point levels 300>350>400 OMG! and temps are doing nothing, it really doesnt fit the narrative.
20
from cached version:
24 Aug: E&E News: Trump reshaped U.S. climate policy in one month: August 2018
by Maxine Joselow and Benjamin Storrow
August was supposed to be a quiet month for climate politics, a time when Congress went on recess; President Trump played golf in Bedminster, N.J.; and Americans took a break from politics before this November’s midterm elections.
Instead, it may go down as a historic turning point in U.S. climate efforts.
EPA launched a whirlwind of actions that stand to exacerbate people’s influence on global temperatures. First came the rollback of clean car rules, an aggressive effort to unravel former President Obama’s program to reduce tailpipe pollution. Then came the Clean Power Plan replacement, another muscular move that dismantles Obama’s signature initiative for curbing emissions from the power sector.
The twin blows could have an outsized impact on carbon-cutting efforts globally, analysts said, potentially slowing the pace of emission reductions internationally and halting momentum to decarbonize the economy. EPA’s own analysis suggests that replacing the two Obama-era standards with Trump’s proposals would increase carbon emissions by as much as 141 million metric tons in 2030 — the equivalent of running around 35 coal-fired power plants for a year.
“I’ve started to describe this as a one-two punch for the climate,” said Janet McCabe, who served as acting EPA air chief under Obama. “If people weren’t convinced already that this administration is not focused on taking real action on climate change, this ought to convince them.”…
“I doubt other countries would pick up the slack to cover less ambition in the U.S. — each country will follow a path that suits it,” said Glen Peters, research director at the Center for International Climate and Environment Research. Trump’s proposals, he added, have the potential to snowball, opening the door for other major economies to reduce or eliminate their emission goals. ***Australia is engaged in debate over whether it should roll back its climate goals.
“If U.S. emissions are likely to go down less fast as previously, or even increase, then the global picture is not so promising,” Peters said.
Dallas Burtraw, a research fellow at Resources for the Future, projects that power-sector emissions will continue to decline. In his view, the real damage from Trump’s proposals could come in the transportation and building sectors. All scenarios for deep decarbonization of the economy largely rely on electrifying transportation, home heating and cooling.
“That is an embryonic trend right now,” Burtraw said, adding that the administration’s moves have a major impact “because it delays this trend toward electrification.”…
https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060095133
10
I think Jo’s point re $1 billion dollars on solar which wont be there when you need it is telling and so blindingly obvious you have to question our politicians wilful ignorance. Come 4-6PM when the heat is fully ramped up on those hot days, solar is well and truly past its peak and rapidly going out the back door.
There was a similar disconnect in NSW with the proposed closure of Lidell. Pollies prattling about a new solar plant as if its an answer when its 10% of the requirement but only at lunchtime on a good day. They seem untroubled by reality, and unwilling to learn the lessons of SA. There OOPS moment cost half a billion dollars, how much will VIC and NSW spend?
90
23 Aug: Livemint: PTC India looking to exit wind power business
by Utpal Bhaskar
New Delhi: The country’s largest electricity trader, PTC India Ltd, is exploring the possibility of exiting its wind power business and is scouting for investors for this, said two people aware of the development. This comes against the backdrop of India’s renewable energy tariffs hitting a record low…
PTC India’s subsidiary, PTC Energy Ltd, has around 290 megawatts of wind assets across Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh…
India’s wind sector has transitioned from a feed-in tariff regime, which ensures a fixed price for wind power producers, to tariff-based competitive auctions. In such a scenario, obtaining finance at the lowest cost has become key.
“There has been a change in the environment with the sector moving from feed-in tariffs regime. PTC doesn’t want to put further money in the asset generation business. It is now looking for investors and is also ready to sell a majority stake and transfer full ownership. PTC is waiting for the responses to come,” said one of the two persons mentioned above requesting anonymity.
“The idea is to either find an investor to scale-up or exit the business,” said the other person aware of the development who also did not want to be named.
The problems faced by the Indian wind energy industry include removing squatters from good wind potential sites, inordinate delays in signing of power purchase agreements, timely payments and distribution firms shying away from procuring electricity generated through wind energy.
***Proper scheduling and forecasting of wind energy and availability of transmission facilities are also areas of concern…
https://www.livemint.com/Companies/505lHej3XKw9o82Vtqx9OP/PTC-India-looking-to-exit-wind-power-business.html
20 Aug: Livemint: Fotowatio Renewable Ventures looks to exit solar project in India
by Utpal Bhaskar
New Delhi: Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (FRV), owned by Abdul Latif Jameel Energy and Environmental Services, plans to exit its only investment in the Indian solar power space, said two people aware of the development…
The proposed exit by FRV, the largest Arabian green energy utility, comes at a time when Indian solar tariffs are hovering around record lows…
“A sales process is being run for the project,” said one of the two people cited above, requesting anonymity…
https://www.livemint.com/Companies/Onjw9wH1hxHyr1VUtGSwXJ/Fotowatio-Renewable-Ventures-looks-to-exit-solar-project-in.html
10
22 Aug: CNBC: Germany’s coal conundrum: Moving toward renewable energy before the infrastructure is ready
by Holly Ellyatt
But despite the a fall in the number of coal plants and the use of renewable energy increasing, Germany faces the problem of creating adequate and “intelligent” power grids across the country to harness and store that renewable energy and then transmit and distribute it.
Output from Germany’s coal plants dropped in the first half of the year as renewable sources of energy — from wind, solar, biomass and hydro power — surpassed coal to become the nation’s largest source of power generation.
Nonetheless, Berlin is falling short in its ambitious renewable energy initiative, known as “energiewende,” that envisages a transition from coal and nuclear power to renewable sources and a low-carbon economy.
According to Germany’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy, it will not meet its pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent (compared to 1990 levels) by 2030, and instead will only achieve a maximum cut of 45 percent.
Germany is still producing a large amount of its energy from coal, with lignite and hard coal around 37 percent of Germany’s power production in 2017 and responsible for over 80 percent of emissions in the energy sector…
***One of the main concerns for Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government is investing in and building an appropriate national power grid that is designed for a new generation of renewable energy. An estimated 7,000 kilometers of power grid routes need to be built, a massive undertaking.
Michael Sen, a member of the managing board of German engineering and energy infrastructure giant Siemens, told CNBC that the energy industry was in a state of transition.
“I think it is way too early to judge on whether we’re missing out on something. We’re in the midst of a journey, the ‘energiewende,’ or energy transition; and we see an underlying trend that there is a societal need for decarbonization; and we’re having more and more distributed and decentralized energy power generation systems; and we’re transitioning from a conventional world to a new energy world,” he said…
Defending Germany’s continuing use of coal, Sen said the energy transition could not just happen “at the flip of a switch.”…
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/22/germany-moving-from-coal-to-renewable-energy-without-infrastructure.html
30
it is called the insanity bug, the only likely cure, would be to cut all power off to the Vic community, but let’s give a secret warning.. to those with still active grey matter, book a cheap flight to Siberia.
50
“Tesla Semi made it ‘across the country alone’ with only Supercharger network and an extension cord, says Elon Musk”
Mr. Musk joked that it was a 1000 mile long extension cord, but the article says that the extension cord plugs into multiple super chargers at once to charge the semi (I didn’t see any indication of how long it takes to complete the recharge). The article indicates that new, special charging station will eventually have to be built for the Tesla semis. I don’t expect to see a fleet of Tesla semis on the road anytime soon.
50
Interesting. How much load was on board?
20
Too early to tell if the new PM can solve the problem. First he has to recognise the problem then he has to have a discussion with various people ranging from experts to engineers to captains of industry, etc. The he has to digest all that information and come to a conclusion using sound reasoning and logic while filtering out the crap a lot of those people will be postulating, many of whom will be contradicting each other. He has to see there is a dilemma that they can’t all be right due to the conflicting arguments. One says we must save the planet from catastrophic global warming while another says there is no such thing. He then has to look at the various solutions to the various problems and non-problems being postulated. For example, what if the CAGW thesis is true? What do we do about it given the rest of the world is doing very little and what they are doing makes absolutely and categorically no difference to the climate. What if the CAGW is a total nonsense? He then has to understand why are power prices so high compare to the rest of the world and see it’s hurting Australia in many ways, and figure out whether all that pain is worth it, which of course it’s not. He must then end up being a realist and a pragmatist if he is truly a sensible man. The solution is then the same no matter what the truth is. The solution is to scrap all RET schemes, abolish all renewables subsidies and let free market forces take over. This of course will lead to the collapse of the renewables industry and make room for the existing coal fired power stations not only to remain but also to bolster them to keep them running for a long time to come, just as what’s happening in other countries such as the US. Where extra power is necessary new ones will have to be built. Time will tell if the new PM is that man. If not then we are back to square one and heading directly to a crash and burn scenario regardless of who is the PM after the next election.
31
Also one other thing. If he does come to the one and only real conclusion as to what to do about energy, he must go on a major campaign to educate the public, which probably would take months with lots of seminars, public speeches and advertising. This will be at great cost but it’s must be done to make people aware of the truth. Otherwise a lot of people will not change their minds and still vote for ALP and Greens. It is also mandatory for another reason. If he fails to reunite the party enough and does nothing on energy policy then he won’t bring back enough of the conservative base to win the next election. If he does the above wrt energy policy then he has at least some chance of winning more of them back plus some who would vote for the ALP or Greens. That might get him across the line but is still very doubtful. So he has to seal his chances of winning the next election by reuniting the party completely. That requires a major shift in how the party deals with the conservative group within the party. I don’t see that happening as yet. If it doesn’t then he will almost guarantee that Shorten will be our next PM.
50
‘…which probably would take months with lots of seminars …’
We can do better than that, the election is six months away.
As I mentioned to Phil on the other thread, the Murdocracy is expanding and will quickly spread the word that coal is good and scientific ignorance is bad.
00
What you, others and I are saying about what should happen is all dependent on Morrison’s next move. It now all hinges on him. If he stuffs it up and becomes just a somewhat watered down version of Turnbull then it will all collapse into a heap especially if he holds the election later rather than sooner. The LNP has stopped at the crossroads so to speak and we are waiting to see which direction they will take. If he wants to take the LNP roughly the same direction as under Turnbull then he should have a snap election to take advantage of the honeymoo0n period, if you can call it that. If he truly intends to take the party in a totally different and much better direction then he has to hold the election as late as possible to give him time to convince the people his party is better than Shorten’s party for the nation.
20
Agreed.
10
‘Chris Uhlmann singled out 2GB’s conservative commentators Alan Jones and Ray Hadley and Sky’s right-wing commentators as being “players in the game” to dispose of Turnbull.
“If they are making phone calls to people trying to push people over the line, then they’re part of the story,” Uhlmann said.
“They’re among the biggest bullies in the land and it’s about time that people called them out for what they are.
“Sky after dark has been running a campaign against Malcolm Turnbull, Sky after dark has been turning Liberal National voters into One Nation voters and they’re not coming back.
“People need to know everyone who is involved in this today because it’s the Australian country that’s at stake here.”
B&T Magazine
“With friends like Sky News, Malcolm Turnbull doesn’t really need any other enemies,” he said.
00
Can you imagine what will happen if Morrison follows the same general path as Turnbull’s policies? In a month the “conservative commentators” would have a field day and end up back where this whole mess started with hardly anyone voting for the LNP. The ABC will not save him if he’s even slightly right of Turnbull. He could actually make things worse than Turnbull for re-election purposes and Shorten will be jumping over the moon. So Morrison better be careful and try to get the “conservative commentators” on his side quick smart. He can’t have both them and the ABC against him at the same time. Are you listening Morrison?
10
Dear Mr Morrison,
You fixed the boat problem. Well done.
The only way you will stay Prime Minister in a country which has the opposition 55% to your 45% is to fix the other problem. Fix the electricity problem which is all a creation of the Liberal party and Federal electricity legislation, the Renewable Energy(Electricity) Act 2000 legislated by John Howard’s government and designed to force coal and gas and diesel and petrol electricity out of business. It’s working.
Repeal the Liberal Act known as the RET, easily the biggest carbon tax in the world, $200 a tonne for coal and $400 a tonne for gas.
Now after nearly twenty years of being robbed to pay for private windmills and solar panels, cheap wind must compete with coal. Consider we have given community group Hepburn Wind a free windmill. Now they get $700,000 a year for free wind but somehow they can’t make a profit with free wind so we give them another $800,000 a year of money just for trying. Our cash so they can have a $700,000 profit. Why? That’s not a subsidy. That’s Government legislated compulsory theft and economic suicide.
Stop the ‘subsidies’. They are all theft. Electrical Swimming pool heaters paid by the very poor for the indulged middle class. Lunch time solar.
Then giant batteries for nothing. Billion dollar interconnectors. New power lines no one needed before, even when they don’t blow over in a high wind. $12Billion just to pump water uphill.
Repeal the Liberal party RET. This would sail through the Senate. The LGCs and STCs are legislated theft. Consider that if wind is cheaper as we are told, they can compete. End this energy Socialism. Stop paying businesses to shut down, paying people not to work and pretend it is all working.
Nothing loses an election like telling a furious electorate that living in the darkness is good for the planet.
Fix the problem. Carbon Dioxide taxes are insane and a slight warming is really a great thing. Ask anyone today.
Besides, if you don’t, you are toast. But only when the wind blows or the sun shines.
141
Great Post.
50
Yes good post. I think we are all in agreement on what should happen. The question that remains to be answered is what will the new PM so? We have to wait and see. The future of the LNP actually now rests on his shoulders. I hope he realises that as he goes through deciding what polices to announce.
30
I know its very early days TdeF, but I suspect he does not get it and remains under the shadow of Turnbull.
But with your recommendations in mind I will try to keep an open mind.
30
My idea is that he and Frydenberg will be fishing for ideas. Here.
Jo’s blog is famous worldwide on matters of Climate Change, Global Warming and carbon dioxide science. It is a place even Breitbart references.
They have no time and no power to create and push through big legislation, big ideas.
They can however stop things and governments are very good at that. Stop Snowy II, stop the GBR gift. Stop hidden payments. Stop the RET. All gain, no pain.
Risk? Daniel Andrews did not worry when he tripled the price of coal to shut down Hazelwood. Or stopped a freeway and cost us $1.2Billion for nothing. Or criminally paid Labor election workers on State salaries. Anything goes. He did not run to the legislature to discuss complex initiatives. He acted.
All the debate in the world will not change the awful Liberal position they inherited from Malcolm.
All the secret payments to companies and workers, the shennigans, the big projects, batteries, diesels, power lines and assistance are a total waste.
Consider Dubai has the population of Queensland. It is 45 every day in summer. Nothing shuts down. They indoor skating rinks and even an indoor ski slope and airconditioned train stations outside, airconditioned bus stops. They are not worried about 0.5C and paying people to leave the country. Fossil fuel gas power. Moving though to nuclear though. We are not even allowed collect firewood.
We were a first world country with the cheapest, almost endless electricity system. How has it come to this? The RET.
Adopt the boat principle. The simplest solution is the best one. Just stop it. Repeal the RET. No debate. You see no amount of legislation will undo the damage it is doing to Australia. You cannot cancel a bad law with more bad laws.
The AEMO predicted summer of blackouts and Morrison and Frydenberg are history. They need to act now. Once coal is profitable again, Hazelwood and Liddell with fire up. The Australian war on carbon dioxide is the stupidest piece of non science I have experienced in my life.
50
Besides, what do they stand to lose? Nothing which is not already lost.
What do they stand to win? Everything. The same as Morrison achieved with the boats, as Italy are copying. The US too. Enforce your laws, your boundaries. We should not be told what to do by the UN/EU/Goldmann Sachs.
It’s not about Abbott. It’s about how they can make a difference fast and take control.
Besides, it is the first step on a plan to get rid of all the absurd (Labor) projects like the NBN, NDIS, Gonski II, Payne’s diesel submarines. Balance the budget.
Show some strength.
Of course, copy the US and resign from Paris. After all, the clause we inserted gave us that right if the US withdrew. Use it. Copy the US. Withdraw from Paris.
98% of all CO2 is generated outside Australia. Why should we be buying Carbon Credits?
41
TdeF
Don’t like your chances
“Morrison’s Ministry – Pyne Defence – Payne Foreign Affairs – Abbott Zip Nada Nothing”
http://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2018/08/morrisons-ministry-pyne-defence-payne-foreign-affairs-abbott-zip-nada-nothing.html
40
Another view
“MORRISON DIVIDES THE CONSERVATIVES – BUT LEAVES THEM STRONGER
Scott Morrison today divided and conquered the conservatives in choosing a new ministry. He snubbed Tony Abbott, sacked Michael Sukkar and took immigration off Peter Dutton. But then he put other conservatives in charge of the issues Abbott and Dutton campaigned on: immigration, electricity and education. Conservatives rule, even if Abbott doesn’t. ”
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/morrison-divides-the-conservatives-but-leaves-them-stronger/news-story/7137fffbd760968dc239e5e4fe07f124
20
Sorry TdeF, Tim Blair has just listed the new cabinet.
same as the old, with a couple of minor changes
ZERO attempt to win back the conservative base.
The Liberals are HISTORY !!!
https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/blogs/tim-blair/bishop-to-pawn/news-story/68570b2a8e804464b17dbae6e7cc67c2
51
That’s very disappointing. He has now only one chance left to show he’s the real deal. He has to smash the renewables nonsense to cut power prices significantly. Otherwise I do hope the ginger group given him hell. As I said before there is room only for one left-wing major party.
30
“The trigger for Friday’s internal coup came over energy policy, which has bedeviled Australian politics for more than a decade. Australia has a wealth of coal, natural gas and uranium, but Australians pay some of the highest electricity prices in the world thanks to federal renewable energy mandates that force retailers to buy expensive wind and solar power.”
Wall Street Journal
80
It’s far worse than that.
We are forced to pay for wind and solar generators in cash even if no one buys their electricity.
Wind and solar people get awarded LGCs and STCs (carbon certificates) which they convert into cash at $83 and $40 a time for the mere fact of generation.
Whether the power is sold is irrelevant and extra money. This is cash, our cash for nothing at all.
For example Hepburn Wind receives their $800,000 even if they never sold a kwhr of power. That’s not a subsidy. That’s not buying anything. That is a gift of our money and should be utterly forbidden by our English legal tradition, being forced to pay friends of the Greens for nothing at all.
If you buy (non exempt fossil fuel power) you have to surrender these electronic certificates supervised by the Department of Clean Energy Regulator. Coal is not ‘clean energy’.
So the cost of buy 4c kw/hr coal is increased by 8c to 12c. The wind people can charge 9c kw/hr, double coal’s price. That is on top of receiving 8.3c anyway. 17.3c for something you can buy for 4c.
The intention was to make coal and gas and oil and petrol and diesel unaffordable. It’s working. Hazelwood closed because it could not make a profit at any price. That’s a police state.
60
Angus Taylor is the new Energy Minister.
‘While at Port Jackson Partners, in February 2013, Taylor authored the report “A proposal to reduce the cost of electricity to Australian electricity users”. The report suggests that the Coalition could immediately drop the renewable energy target entirely and save up to $3.2 billion by 2020 and still meet emissions reduction targets.’ wiki
30
Targets are nothing. They have to read the ACT. Targets are a smokescreen. The Energy Regulator reports on how they are going relative to the targets.
The sting, the compulsion is in the fines for not having the compulsory certificates, not some nebulous ‘targets’. The cash in the free money plus the fact that it only applies to ‘fossil’ fuels.
20
Okay, thanks.
Keith Pitt has resigned and gone to the backbench, with ominous implications.
00
It’s interesting to see how just about everyone agrees both major parties are on the nose. It was a similar story in the US back before Trump was elected as President. The massive support of the left by the MSM both here and in the US are also very similar. Yet the one big difference is we don’t have a Trump to fill the vacuum. Could the new PM be that person even though as a leader of the party he hasn’t been through an election yet? Let’s hope so for the sake of the nation.
31
Well, if the new PM is a pragmatist he is more likely to
hear the electors, that would be an improvement on the last PM.
31
Depends on whether Morrison can discard all of the disease he was infected with while working for Turnbull.
40
Morrison also wants to balance the budget. So does Frydenberg. Peter Costello will have told him the simple rule. STOP SPENDING.
Balancing the budget though will not win an election. Labor knows that. Morrison and Frydenberg have to do something which will win over the cross bench, One Nation and all the doubters who see them as Turnbull trainees.
Walk away from Paris. Stop the RET. Watch the whole rotten ‘Clean Energy’ structure come tumbling down. Walk away from the ‘greatest moral challenge of a generation’. Man made global warming is nonsense.
Consider that if you could change the climate, wouldn’t most people vote for a bit warmer? 0.5C? Where’s the problem? We have had 30 years of this. There is no problem.
31
Balance the budget? Impossible unless they want to unleash a major recession. Even Trump knows that.
00
I’ll rephrase that. They might be able to balance the budget for a year or two but the national debt will never be paid off. It will keep growing until we go bust.
10
behind paywall. saw mentin of this on Sky News during a change of ends at women’s tennis final in US. can’t find anything online apart from:
BREAKING: Pitt announces shock resignation from cabinet
News Mail-38 minutes ago
HINKLER MP Keith Pitt will not serve in Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s new … In his resignation announcement, Mr Pitt hit out at the Paris Agreement and the Labor Party. “I have today advised the Deputy Prime Minister …
TWEET: Daily Telegraph: Keith Pitt, the Liberal member for Hinkler, has quit the position of Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister to move to the backbench.
from comment by David of Sydney at PickeringPost:
MORRISON IS KEEPING THE PARIS AGREEMENT
THERE IS ALREADY A DIVISION IN THE PARTY OVER ENERGY POLICY BY SUNDAY AFTERNOON
KEITH PITT ANTI-GREEN POLICY RESIGNS.
30
should be “mention” not “mentin” in first line…
on Sky I think they said he was against Australia being in the Paris Agreement and that was why he has resigned. didn’t hear the rest, if there was anything more.
10
Lost for words. Maybe Morrison is really just Turnbull all over again. Maybe he made a promise to Turnbull to keep the Climate Change Faith? Then the whole exercise was for nothing. Turnbull was a lame duck, a dead duck. These two guys may as well quack today. It’s not enough to argue that Bill Shorten will be worse. Few people now believe that is possible.
50
“I will always put reducing power prices before Paris.”
full letter here if you can see it…can’t copy.
Trendsmap: Matthew Doran
Nationals MP Keith Pitt has resigned from the frontbench @politicsabc #auspol
Full letter
https://www.trendsmap.com/twitter/tweet/1033582933615894528
21
Ignore the red
00
26 Aug: Keith Pitt MP: MEDIA STATEMENT FROM KEITH PITT MP:
I have today advised the Deputy Prime Minister and Prime Minister of my decision to resign from the ministry. It has been a great privilege to serve the Australian people, particularly in a role which delivers much needed infrastructure to the regions.
However, I will always put the national interest and the interests of my constituents above my own. I will always put reducing power prices, before Paris.
I provide my genuine thanks to the leadership for the opportunities I have been provided. I look forward to contesting the next election and Scott Morrison and his new executive has my full support. A Bill Shorten Labor government will only result in higher taxes, higher power prices and less money in people’s pockets
https://keithpitt.com.au/news/media-statement
30
26 Aug: Guardian: Julie Bishop resigns as foreign affairs minister after failed leadership bid
by Ben Doherty
Shortly after Bishop’s resignation, Queensland Nationals MP and assistant minister for trade, investment, and tourism Keith Pitt announced he would also leave the ministry. He will remain in parliament and says he will contest the next election.
But Pitt’s resignation statement hinted at continued disquiet within the Coalition over the Liberals’ disunity, and over energy and climate policies.
“I will always put the national interest and the interests of my constituents above my own. I will always put reducing power prices before Paris,” he said, a reference to the Paris climate agreement Australia committed to in 2015.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/aug/26/julie-bishop-resigns-as-foreign-minister-after-failed-leadership-bid
30
There is only one reason for Pitt to resign. They are staying in Paris. That means they can do nothing except punish the electricity retailers, the same people the Government is using to steal from electricity users to pay for windmills and solar panels.
It’s all very disappointing after the excitement of removing the Green Prime Minister and his wife and now even Mrs Macbeth.
60
behind paywall:
Lock-ins mean no sharp exits from Paris Agreement
The Australian – 4 days ago
No formal decision for Australia to quit the Paris Agreement to cut carbon emissions can be made until well after the next federal election. … Graham Lloyd
—
still don’t know what is in the above, but have seen arguments that if Coalition govt announced withdrawal, it would mean nothing if Labor wins the next election because they could simply reverse the decision.
plus there’s the con of having to wait 4 years for a withdrawal to be effective. that, alone, is sufficient reason why we should not have signed up, or ratified it in the first place.
however, if the Coalition wants to differentiate itself from Labor, then why not announce withdrawal, or a plan to withdraw, so that Labor would need to campaign on staying in.
Labor would be up against 48% wanting out, while 40% want to stay in. if the public had the facts in front of them during a campaign – the plans for the transport and agriculture sector, the ever-rising price of CO2 emissions (if the carbon cowboys get their way) etc., then the percentage wanting out might jump considerably.
18 Jul: JoNova: Just like that: 48% of Australians happy to pull out of Paris
Almost two thirds, 63 per cent, of voters also claimed that cheaper power should be governments’ priority with only 24 per cent believing reducing emissions should take precedence…
http://joannenova.com.au/2018/07/just-like-that-48-of-australians-happy-to-pull-out-of-paris/
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It could be like the brexit vote, the people said “out” but globalist May is trying to sabotage it….
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Back on topic, the Victorian government looks like it will continue to go the way the previous Labor SA government went on renewables. If they win the next election it will be catastrophic for them. If NSW goes to Labor too, which is possible but too early to tell then the whole of the eastern states will have a horrific time with energy reliability and cost. If Morrison is aware of this he will have to step in and do something drastic to save us from the renewables madness. That’s assuming he wins the next election of course, which is anyone’s guess at the moment. I think I can already sense the sound and smell of a crash and burn coming. Let’s hope it’s just my imagination.
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If australias power grid collapses, companies will leave, and so will employment, but hey, North Korea seems to survive while starving …
The Zimbabwe of the pacific.
If the punters dont riot when the grid dies, people will be shown to be in a spiritual zombie state of no return. Perhaps as ive said in the past, this is Gods judgement upon Australua for turning our back on Him….
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I used to say we could end up being the Mexico of our region but Zimbabwe could be more accurate I suppose.
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Serious reading here IMO
“Breaking the Climate Spell”
“Getting out of the Paris Agreement was just the first step on the road to a realist global energy policy.”
https://www.weeklystandard.com/rupert-darwall/breaking-the-climate-spell
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Check the “cheap power” at AEMO data dashboard just now!
All except Tas > $130
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Now the Morrison Cabinet
No Abbott.
Marise Payne is Foreign Affairs. Christopher Pyne is defence. Birmingham out of education into Trade, Tourism and Investment.
This is an utter waste. Same government, Morrison as Turnbull.
Doomed. When does Morrison reintroduce the NEG II? To go with NDIS II, NBN II, Snowy II and Gonski II?
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Andrew Bolt is optimistic
Catholic Dan Tehan is now Education Minister, to fix the damaging brawl with Catholic schools that the Left’s Simon Birmingham caused with his botched new funding scheme.
“Angus Taylor, a new generation conservative, has been made Minister for Energy, or as Morrison said yesterday, the “minister for reducing electricity prices”. No mention of cutting emissions.
And Alan Tudge, who backed Dutton, was promoted to Minister for Cities, Urban Infrastructure and Population – “the minister for congestion busting”.
Morrison has divided and conquered the conservatives, yet put them in charge of issues that matter to them.”
All meaningless if we stay in Paris.
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Angus Taylor will undoubtedly suggest the government get rid of the RET, but what about building new Hele?
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What about turning Hazelwood on? Who needs HELE and a five year wait? Or turn it on an upgrade it, but turn it on.
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We have discussed this before, Angus Taylor may need convincing.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-16/zero-chance-hazelwood-will-ever-reopen/9550498
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Yes. Also disappointed that Tony Abbott is not on the front bench. However, there are some good moves. Marise Payne out of Defence, good. Simon Birmingham out of education, good. Angus Taylor in for Energy, good! I feel a bit more optimistic about Taylor being in Energy. He is anti windmills, that’s a good start!
Dunno about Payne being in FA, and Pyne in Defence. Not sure if either of those are good moves.
However, Morrison is NOT Turnbull! At this point, I’m feeling a bit agnostic about the change. I will look on with interest to see how the LNP pull together, and put Labor on the back foot!
We can always hope!
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‘Dunno about Payne being in FA ….’
Political correct sop, while Abbott will be offered a junior ministry to keep him locked in and passive.
10
and Pyne is still threatening China with his diesel submarines, after 2030. Maybe.
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That’s as good a view as you could take. The issues though are Paris, Electricity supply AND prices, ridiculous immigration levels including 2/3 overstaying visas, Catholic education funding. There is little time to settle into ministries.
Also as with BREXIT, remember the deep state, the bureaucrats wrote the laws, support the endless and useless Green departments like Clean Energy and advise the ministers. They have behind most of this and Canberra does run on windmills. It hardly matters though if the lights go out in Canberra. 98% of Washington voted for Hillary. Canberra is Green with endless Sir Humphry Applebees.
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Is that because windmills are only rated to 40C and then shut down to prevent oil fires?
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Scott Morrison handed around a lump of coal in parliament.
“This is coal,” the treasurer said triumphantly, brandishing the trophy as if he’d just stumbled across an exotic species previously thought to be extinct.
“Don’t be afraid,” he said, soothingly, “don’t be scared.”
Guardian
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theirABC leaves out “Paris” when mentioning Pitt resignation:
26 Aug: ABC: Scott Morrison announces new ministry with Julie Bishop replaced by Marise Payne as foreign affairs minister
By political correspondent Louise Yaxley
Joyce appointed drought envoy
There is a new role for former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce as special envoy for drought assistance and recovery.
“We have an ability for our members who have served in leadership roles in the past to be drawn on, to engage with Australians on some of these big challenges,” Mr Morrison said.
“I am pleased that Barnaby has agreed to take on the role.”
***He has indicated former PM Tony Abbott could also have a similar job but that has not been settled yet.
In a sign of the ongoing policy tension, Nationals MP Keith Pitt has announced he has resigned from the ministry because of his concerns over energy prices…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-26/scott-morrison-announces-new-cabinet-after-julie-bishop-quits/10166300
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25 Aug: news.com.au: Ausgrid working to restore power to thousands after mass Sydney blackout
TRAFFIC is at a standstill, trains are delayed and almost 40,000 homes were left without power thanks to a huge power outage.
by Natalie Wolfe
Just before 2pm, Ausgrid tweeted it was working to restore power to most parts of Sydney’s inner west in what appeared to be a citywide power outage.
Around 23,000 customers across Homebush, the inner west and surrounding areas were left sitting in the dark, bringing traffic to a standstill.
The power company then tweeted power was also out to around 15,400 customers in parts of Croydon, Ashfield, Five Dock.
Ausgrid has since restored power to the thousands of customers…
A spokesman for the company said they were working to figure out how almost 40,000 people were left without electricity for more than an hour…
https://www.news.com.au/technology/ausgrid-working-to-restore-power-to-thousands-after-mass-sydney-blackout/news-story/a0c33c8a29ed2b807f9cb02c56dc53fb
MSM didn’t get excited over this news, and hard to find any updates, except for the following:
25 Aug Updated: SBS: AAP: Sydney blackout affects thousands
“Everyone is back on. As of 3pm all power has been restored,” an Ausgrid spokesman told AAP.
***A system failure between northern NSW and Queensland caused the blackout, the spokesman said…
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/sydney-blackout-affects-thousands
https://twitter.com/Qldaah/status/1033338676984479746
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just noticed the careless reporting in the SBS/AAP piece:
About 45,000 homes in Sydney and the NSW Hunter Valley were left without power on Saturday afternoon…
Almost 50,000 homes have been affected by a blackout in Sydney and parts of NSW…
The outage happened just after 1pm on Saturday, with Ausgrid emergency crews able to restore electricity to the 45,000 homes by 3pm…
Sydney’s inner west was hit hardest, with about 23,000 homes left without power, while parts of the NSW Hunter region and Central Coast were also affected.
the twitter link that was accidentally posted was what led me to find the SBS update.
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Giles has dropped all pretense at objectivity – lengthy, READ ALL, including comments:
26 Aug: RenewEconomy: Morrison names leading anti-wind campaigner as energy minister
by Giles Parkinson
New prime minister Scott Morrison has ended the experiment of combining the energy and environment portfolios, and appointed one of the country’s most prominent anti-wind campaigners as energy minister, and a former mining industry lawyer as environment minister…
He named Dutton numbers man Angus Taylor as energy minister , and Melissa Price – a former mining company lawyer – as environment minister, and in doing so appeared to abandon any efforts to seek emissions reductions in the electricity sector, or anywhere else for that matter…
The appointment of Taylor – along with the retention of Dutton as Home Affairs Minister – seems to be Morrison gift of appeasement to the “shock-jock” Gods that are as suspicious of him as they were of Malcolm Turnbull. Taylor is one of the shock jock favourites…
Taylor is considered a hero by Stop These Things (which refers to environmentalists as “greentards” and other charming names) for his relentless opposition to wind farms….
Taylor also shares a common work history with the ACCC chair Rod Sims, who holds similar views to Taylor on renewables, subsidies and fossil fuel generation.
Both were senior executives at Port Jackson Partners…
https://reneweconomy.com.au/morrison-names-leading-anti-wind-campaigner-as-energy-minister-49560
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Sounds good so far. As I said elsewhere Morrison has to make significant changes to please and recover much of the conservative base the LNP has lost in order to have even a hope of winning the next election. His success or failure in doing so will be reflected in due course by the so called “conservative commentators”. Morrison better not be like Turnbull and shoot the messenger otherwise he will go down in flames. In fact Morrison better make some appearances with Sky News, 2GB and other so called “conservative commentators” quick smart to quell the anger. Otherwise he’s gone before he has even started.
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Morrison needs to dump Martin Parkinson, head of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, plus former Greens Senate Candidate Lin Hatfield Dodds, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Social Policy — both Turnbull-appointees.
Hose the Turnbull manure out of the stables, or there’ll be a lot of foot-dragging by those green types.
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Too late for that. We just have to hope Morrison gives the command to steer the energy policy in the right direction to cut prices not emissions. If not then goodbye Australia as Shorten becomes PM.
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‘Two interstate power interconnectors blow in a dramatic reminder to Morrison to fix energy policy.’ Oz
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this is the kind of CAGW insanity that needs to be conveyed to the Australian public. from cached version:
26 Aug: HeraldScotland: Experts call for North Sea oil closure to cut climate pollution
by Rob Edwards
Scotland must “rapidly” shut down its North Sea oil and gas industry to cut pollution and combat climate change, according to a forthcoming report from scientists seen by the Sunday Herald.
Carbon emissions from petrochemical plants, oil terminals, cement works and other major polluters will have to cease if Scotland is to play its part in reducing the risk of heatwaves, droughts, storms and floods caused by global warming, they warn.
They also call on the Scottish Government to “decarbonise” transport and heating, boost energy efficiency in buildings, cut waste, expand forests by a third and restore peat bogs. Ministers must toughen their targets to cut climate pollution to “net zero” by 2050, they say.
The oil industry, however, stressed its value to the Scottish economy and urged a “pragmatic approach”. Other industries highlighted the efforts they were already making to reduce their carbon emissions.
***The new report has been written by leading experts from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of Manchester and Uppsala University in Sweden. It was commissioned by the umbrella group, Stop Climate Chaos Scotland, and the environmental group, Friends of the Earth Scotland…
They conclude that for Scotland to meet its global responsibilities it can only emit a total of 300 million tonnes more carbon dioxide – meaning it has to cut emissions by at least ten per cent every year starting now…
The report points out that if the world is to meet international climate targets 70-80 per cent of known fossil fuel reserves must stay in the ground. “Scotland needs to begin an urgent and phased closure of its oil and gas sector,” it says.
“Scotland is a wealthy industrial nation with excellent prospects for renewable energy. The Scottish Government needs urgently to enact policies to rapidly cease hydrocarbon production from its oil and gas sector.”…
Scotland should “eliminate all its industrial process carbon dioxide emissions prior to 2050,” the report argues. The country should help lead the global effort to reduce industrial emissions “particularly from cement production”, it says…
One of the report’s authors is Dr Jaise Kuriakose, a climate expert from the University of Manchester. “We need a significant change across our entire economy,” he told the Sunday Herald.
“It is not a case of one sector being able to do all the work whilst others carry on as they are. Because the remaining carbon budget is so small, we must genuinely deliver a transition to living in a low carbon way across all sectors.”
Immediate action was essential if Scotland was to make a fair contribution to the Paris climate agreement, Kuriakose argued. “Scotland should begin an urgent and phased closure of its oil and gas sector and move to a 100 per cent renewable energy economy while ensuring a just transition for the workers in the sector.”
He called for “complete decarbonisation of road transport, increased energy efficiency from buildings and decarbonised heating in the next two decades”. To ensure net land emissions reached zero by 2050 he argued that “a 35 per cent increase in total forest land is required along with restoration of peatlands and wetlands”…
According to Dr Richard Dixon, director of Friends of the Earth Scotland, the Scottish Government’s draft climate bill would fail to deliver the pollution cuts needed. “It is almost beyond belief that the bill requires almost no further emissions reductions any time in the next decade,” he said.
“Instead we need radical action in housing, agriculture, farming and industry. We need emissions from industries like refining, cement making, steel works and chemicals plants to fall to zero.”…
But the North Sea industry argued that oil and gas were vital for energy security. “The offshore industry supports hundreds of thousands of jobs and contributes billions to the economy,” said environment director for the industry body Oil & Gas UK, Matt Abraham.
“With official figures estimating oil and gas will still meet two thirds of the UK’s energy needs by 2035, it is clear that we need a pragmatic approach to our future energy mix.” …
CPI environmental director, Steve Freeman: “A simple focus on the direct release of emissions in Scotland is simply wrong. Closing down Scottish industry would reduce emissions to zero, but have no effect on the global release of greenhouse gases as production simply moves from Scotland to other locations where carbon costs are lower.”…
BREAKOUT: Visions of how Scotland could cut climate pollution
Transport
The Scottish Government has promised to “phase out the need for diesel and petrol cars and vans by 2032”. This would mean widespread use of electric vehicles, backed by a greatly expanded charging network.
Public transport would need to improve, while cycling and walking increase. The cost of air travel would need to increase to reflect its pollution, and airports would not be expanded…
http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/16599722.experts-call-for-north-sea-oil-closure-to-cut-climate-pollution/
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26 Aug: Guardian/Observer: City mayors make joint call for urgent action to tackle UK air pollution
Civic leaders representing 20 million people sign letter calling for clean air plan
by Robin McKie
City leaders across England and Wales have teamed up to demand that Theresa May take immediate action to fight air pollution, which scientists say causes at least 40,000 premature deaths a year in the UK.
A total of 17 mayors and civic leaders, representing 20 million people throughout the country, have signed a letter that calls for a national action plan to clean up the nation’s air to be implemented as a matter of urgency. They include the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, as well as mayors Andy Burnham (Greater Manchester), Steve Rotheram (Liverpool city region), and Dan Jarvis (Sheffield), along with leaders from authorities around the country including Cardiff, Leeds, Newcastle and Southampton.
The group is demanding that the government:
• Pass a stringent clean air act that will give local authorities powers to regulate emissions such as those produced by taxis and private hire services in cities.
• Set up a targeted vehicle renewal scheme to replace older, more polluting cars, buses and lorries, but in a way that will protect local businesses.
• Provide funds to support the establishment of clean air zones and provide investment in cleaner buses, taxis and other forms of transport.
The letter, also sent to the chancellor, Philip Hammond, and the environment secretary, Michael Gove, was written in the wake of the national clean air summit in June when many civic leaders met to debate the air pollution crisis. The event was jointly hosted by the mayor of London, the UK100 cities network and the Institute for Public Policy Research…
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/aug/26/action-demanded-mayors-save-uk-inner-city-poor-from-air-pollution
22 Aug: Chatham House: Hoffmann Centre for Sustainable Resource Economy: Flexibility: Shifting the Power Balance
As renewables become a large share of the global energy mix, greater electricity system flexibility will be critical and will originate from the small scale, write Daniel Quiggin and Antony Froggatt.
(Daniel Quiggin, Research Fellow, Energy, Environment and Resources, Chatham House
Antony Froggatt, Senior Research Fellow, Energy, Environment and Resources)
Over the past decade, the electricity sector has experienced a profound disruptive shock especially in the European Union, Australia and parts of North America…
***Bloomberg New Energy Finance also estimates that by 2040, nearly three-quarters of the $10.2 trillion invested in new power-generating capacity will be in renewables.
While this renewables rollout is a key part of global climate policy, the challenge is that the costs associated with managing the system start to escalate once renewables exceed a 30 per cent share of generated electricity. Unless properly planned for, the growth in electric vehicle use and electric heating could further amplify these ‘system integration costs’. They include the cost of holding fossil fuel power plants in reserve for periods of low renewable supply, grid upgrades and the dumping of power from renewables when system constraints are reached…
So, as renewable energy pushes beyond 30 per cent, and as a growing number of cars and domestic-heating systems begin to add to power usage, how can governments ensure electricity is affordable? The answer is ‘flexibility’…READ ON
https://hoffmanncentre.chathamhouse.org/article/decentralised-flexibility/
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26 Aug: 9News: AAP: Newspoll: Coalition support plunges after leadership spill
The latest Newspoll has revealed popular support for the Coalition has crashed to its lowest level in a decade.
The Australian’s Nwspoll has the coalition’s primary vote slipping to 33 percent and Labor’s rising to 41 percent days after Malcolm Turnbull was ousted and Scott Morrison inserted as prime minister.
On a two-party preferred split Labor sits at 56 per cent to the government’s 44 percent.
Newspoll also has Opposition Leader Bill Shorten as more popular than Mr Morrison, 39 percent to 33 percent…
But a Fairfax ReachTEL poll of 1047 done on August 25 and 26 has Mr Morrison edging out Mr Shorten in three marginal seats – Deakin, Dickson and Reid.
The poll showed support for the coalition had dropped in the three Liberal-held seats since the 2016 election, but still had the government slightly in front…
https://www.9news.com.au/national/2018/08/26/22/03/newspollcoalition-support-plunges-after-leadership-spill
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I found the report in attachment B to this report here:
http://aemo.com.au/-/media/Files/Media_Centre/2017/AEMO_Summer-operations-2017-18-report_FINAL.pdf
It notes that the power shortages in Victoria will also bring down the SA grid and force outages there. Basically, the SA grid relies on power from Vic to keep going. When Vic has a sniffle, SA gets the flu.
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read all:
25 Aug: The Hill: Markets, not ‘renewable energy’ magic, ensure the affordable supply of electricity
By Bill Peacock
(Bill Peacock is the vice president of research at the Texas Public Policy Foundation)
California is the home of the original Magic Kingdom — and magical thinking. The California legislature is deliberating whether to mandate 100 percent renewable energy for its electric grid by 2045.
In a recent op-ed (LINK), the Manhattan Institute’s Robert Bryce points out that simple math demonstrates the futility of this effort.
Bryce explains that to fill all of California’s electrical needs with solar power would require about 219,000 megawatts, more than exists in the entire world today.
Similarly, relying on wind energy would fill up about 16,000 square miles of California with wind turbines, “a land area roughly four times the size of L.A. County.” In Texas, which uses significantly more electricity than California, wind turbines would cover 200 of Texas’ 254 counties to produce enough electricity to keep the lights on.
Of course, that’s assuming the wind is always blowing. Which it is not. This intermittency — which is also inherent in solar power — is what dooms efforts to mandate increased use of renewable energy…
A new paper by Charles McConnell (LINK) shows that when we need power the most — during the hottest days of the year — wind power isn’t there.
It’s not a matter of capacity; Texas has more wind generation capacity than any other state, at a projected 29,000 megawatts by the end of the year. But there’s a big difference in the installed capacity of wind and the deliverability of reliable electricity when needed…
http://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/403592-markets-not-renewable-energy-magic-ensure-the-affordable-supply-of
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26 Aug: Guardian: The mood on Brexit is turning. Labour can turn too
As former Leave-voting constituencies start to waver, the party is now free to act in Britain’s interest and oppose this Tory folly.
by William Keegan, Observer’s senior economics commentator
There is a time-honoured expression for offering something that is not needed: “that’s like taking coals to Newcastle” – the north-east of England, of course, for most of the 20th century having been a centre of working coal mines. More recently, however, the coalfields were so run down that, before the carbon tax was introduced in 2013, we were importing coal from Russia and South America for power stations not that far from Newcastle…
Coal and steel were integral to the production of instruments of war…
Since I regard Brexit as the biggest British economic folly I have ever had to cover, it is the economic damage that I concentrate on. But there is an obvious worry, if we do head for a “no-deal” exit, that there could be wider geopolitical ramifications, at a time when Trump and his friend Putin seem to be set on causing as much damage to the EU as they can…
Now, whenever I have asked some Labour MPs why, frankly, they have been so supine on this issue, when they regard Brexit as damagingly absurd, their answers have indicated that because they represented Leave constituencies, they were frightened of losing their seats (sometimes this would be put in the context of wanting to honour the views of their constituents, you understand).
Well, the poll reported a fortnight ago in this newspaper indicated that in Labour’s heartlands, “more than 100 Leave seats now back Remain”. Moreover, another recent poll found that 79% of voters aged 18-24 support remaining in the EU…
It is surely time for Labour to get its act together when parliament reassembles and help to save the nation from further humiliation. When pressed last week on the Today programme, the shadow Brexit secretary, Sir Keir Starmer, refused to be drawn into ruling out another referendum. He emphasised that he was keeping options open…
The only sensible option is to remain in the EU that the predecessors of Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn fought so hard to join.
And the legacy of the Durham miners? The unions, too, know these days which side their bread is buttered.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/aug/26/brexit-mood-turning-labour-turn-too
26 Aug: CleanTechnica: Connecting The Dots: A Firsthand Account Of How The UKIP Surge Drove The Tories To Sabotage The Renewables Industry
by guest contributor; Originally posted on Spin Watch – 29 July
Having spent years working in the renewable energy industry, especially in the UK South West, I witnessed first-hand the political and economic backlash against the industry. As is often the case, with the anti-renewables backlash, there is more going on than first meets the eye.
My foray into renewable energy started in 2014 at a small company in Tiverton, Devon, and then on to Source Renewable in North Devon to take on the role of marketing manager.
Working for a bigger player, I tried to promote our “solar photovoltaic (PV) success stories” in the local press and was surprised at how difficult it was…
Shortly after the 2015 election, Sir Ed Davey (ex-Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change) warned us at a Regen SW renewable energy event that the Chancellor, George Osborne, was pro-gas. And that Osborne was “pro-gas of any kind” and the Feed-in Tariff was likely to be reviewed. Our hearts sank.
We all started campaigning to save the solar industry. But our campaigning failed and the Feed-in Tariff was cut by 65 per cent.
My company, Source Renewable, went bust and I moved to Solarsense, a larger company just outside Bristol. I lasted another 12 months before that company went down from 26 to 8 staff. The solar PV industry lost over 12,500 jobs and domestic solar installation rates fell off a cliff…
Why did the Conservative party destroy a business sector supported by investors, private companies and innovative tech industry startups?
The Conservative party has around 70,000 party members. Forty-four per cent of members are over 65 years old and 71 per cent are male. Climate change was not part of the school curriculum 20 years ago.
***(LOL) And if the mainstream media doesn’t talk about it (BBC Radio 4 and The Daily Telegraph) party members won’t care about it. In addition, Conservative MPs in the West Country reacted to the rise of UKIP…
Politicians are just beginning to realise that the same pattern has occurred in relation to renewable energy as Brexit. And that the UKIP–Trump alliance is still active and holding us to ransom via social media campaigns and an oil industry agenda.
https://cleantechnica.com/2018/08/26/connecting-the-dots-a-firsthand-account-of-how-the-ukip-surge-drove-the-tories-to-sabotage-the-renewables-industry/
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Dual blackouts put new generation on notice.
Two vital interstate power interconnectors blew without warning at the weekend, causing blackouts and critical industrial incidents and isolating two states from the national electricity grid, in a dramatic reminder to Scott Morrison just days into his prime ministership of the nation’s energy policy paralysis.
The Australian Energy Market Operator last night ruled the transmission failure was causd by a lightning strike, and withdrew a notice to generators to boost supply over coming days as precautionary measure.
The nation’s biggest single-site power user, the Tomago aluminium smelter in the NSW Hunter Valley, lost power without warning, halting two pot lines for up to an hour. Alcoa’s Portland smelter in Victoria was also affected, losing power for about 50 minutes.
Thousands of households across NSW lost power, while the outage caused signalling problems and delays on Sydney rail networks.
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This could have really been lightning and this is supported by the recent change in the weather and the short down time.
What we Don’t want, in the future, is for outages caused by failing generation capacity or insufficient supply to be labeled “lightning” as a cover-up.
KK
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That was my immediate thought KK.
10
It seems that we were wrong.
10
I find it odd to see how CAGW advocates keep warning us of increasingly volatile weather yet proclaim the only solution is to replace reliable base load pwoer with unreliable renewables. There’s a word for that sort of approach – insanity.
30
Alan Kohler must know something.
‘We might finally get a clear choice at the next election: action on climate change versus no action.’ Oz
00
You would think a large-scale infrastructure project, one that is expected to endure for a generation or more, would be built to handle *one-in-ten year* events.
How do they think we manage in places like where I’m at – where its 104F/40C as I type this – when that temperature is considered a *cool summer day*? There’s massive demand here in the summer and negligible demand over the winter, spring, and fall but no one would think of saying ‘well, you’ll just have to deal with the heat because we’re only going to supply energy at rates to cover the average demand of the rest of the year and not peak demand’.
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