Who will pay for the cleaning up job?
By 2050, the world will be throwing out 2 million tons of wind turbines and 6 million tons of solar panels every year.
One reason the world may be throwing away so much not-so-renewable waste is that recycling it costs ten times as much as what is recovered.
Who would have thought that collecting low density energy in extreme environments would create megatons of tough, non-biodegradable infrastructure, embedded with toxic heavy metals?
Graveyard of the green giants: It’s the hidden cost of our dash for windpower – thousands of decommissioned blades that are so difficult to recycle, they are just dumped as landfill,
writes TOM LEONARD, DailyMail
Scientists at America’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory have warned that in the next few decades, the world faces a ‘tidal wave’ of redundant blades that will number ‘hundreds of thousands, if not more’.
By 2050, it’s predicted that the world will need to dispose of two million tons of wind turbine blade waste every year. In the UK, the volume already exceeds 100,000 tons per year.
The International Renewable Energy Agency estimates that by 2050, up to 78 million tons of solar panels will have reached the end of their life and the world will create another six million tons of photovoltaic waste every year. Where to put all of that is potentially an even bigger headache than the turbine blades. It’s very complicated to recover the more valuable materials, such as silver and silicon, used in solar panels.
Research suggests the cost of recovering the materials outweighs the cost of extracting what can be reused by a ratio of ten to one. In other words, if the cost of recycling is $10 you get only $1 back.
And unlike wind turbine blades, solar panels contain toxic materials such as lead that can contaminate the ground as they break down, so dumping them in landfill sites poses serious issues.
And what about the lithium-ion batteries used in electric cars? Here, too, there’s a money issue. Japanese researchers say the value of the materials that can be recycled from them is about a third of the cost of the recycling operation, while it’s five times cheaper to mine new lithium than extract the old lithium from batteries.
Did you know that when you virtuously shelled out £45,000 on a Tesla Model 3?
Scale is difficult:
h/t Steve H
As usual, the real costs never have been calculated in advance. But with some brain, they it was obvious they will appear and be payed.
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Don’ t forget the costs include that of child labour digging out the metals , the awful environmental damage, the equally bad processing and that the majority of solar panels, according to Forbes, are made by coerced uighurs in Chia.
Funnily enough when I point out these facts to greens they don’t seem interested. That cost is nothing compared to somehow saving the planet.
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Surely if these technologies are to continue in use the first move should be to redesign the components to formats which can be serviced to extend their lives.
That won’t be much help for existing infrastructure.
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Opponents of nuclear energy always seem to complain about the waste that is generated which is claimed to take aeons to become less radioactive, even though IIRC there are reactors that can use other reactor waste as some of their fuel
How does this differ from ‘renewable’ waste that never breaks down as well as being poisonous?
Another factor that seems to be ignored is that the older wind farms are reaching the end of their life so will need replacing.
Presumably when we become the Saudi Arabia of wind we will have a large rolling bill to refurbish or replace the current generation of wind generators, with maybe a slightly longer turnover period for solar panels.
So much for such energy becoming cheaper.
Maybe this is what is meant by renewables providing plenty of well paying jobs in the future.
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Well Tony. With Klaus Schwab’s great reset. We can all dig out the rear metals for him and then qualify to rent something so we can be happy. I have no doubt he Great reset, if successful, would create an enormous slave class that can be used to save the planet.
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Rare metals of course
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Why didn’t they make the components out of hemp? or tofu.
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Vegan blades?
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Why not ?
50
Whenever a civilisation is on the decline, it tends to make lots of stupid decisions, some major. We’ve witnessed a number of them carried out with great “precision” by the West over the past many decades, each time being worse than the previous. To those who think things will eventually get better by themselves, face reality as it never works that way. Self-destruction is never pretty. In fact it’s catastrophic. It all starts with political “leaders” and “captains of industries” who lose the plot and end up being the real enemies of the people. History repeats.
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PeterS,
Do you have any “captains of industry” by name or office?
I cannot recall them making too many bad decisions of much consequence, but am willing to learn. Geoff S
54
Well Geoff,
Let me start with the current boss of BP (BTW he insists in writing BP in lowercase)
He is a guy from County Kerry in Ireland by the name of Mr Looney.
He states that BP is to become “Carbon Neutral” and not to be recognised as an Energy Company. Instead they are to become a world leader in Un Reliables.
I am not sure that other Kerry person – John – who recently regretted the Russian invasion of Ukraine might set back Global Warming mitigation is related, but the Irish habit of telling Kerryman jokes is coming to pass.
Mr Looney is not the only Oil executive to have gone rogue as their shareholders are now infested with green fanatics,
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So, Patrick,
Does the blame rest with green shareholders, or with the Chief, who is encouraged by law to maximise returns to the shareholders? Geoff S
20
The Board of Australia’s BHP would be high on that list.
As well there is the attention seeker founder of Fortescue Minerals.
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Then learn. Lots of material freely available to teach you the truth. Don’t let me stop you. Go to work!
11
Geoff, whilst due to my name and recent reputation, I get your question and also keenly see no polite answer. We all need to be shrewd in our observations.
I’m looking carefully at the possible motivations of nearly anyone.
10
This is so apropos as I am preparing some testimony for a renewable facility siting hearing coming up this week.
How many really dire problems have to be pointed out before people wake up to this issue? The renewables are taking us to a place around 1865 as far as energy density, reliability, and cost go. It’s worse than that, however, as we will tear-up lord knows how much of the environment to get to the needed minerals. The transition will require first-costs that cannot be assembled, and capitalized costs that will require all of national savings (in the U.S. anyway) every year.
It’s crazy. Reason is currently in a coma.
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Kevin. The problem is, as it always is, the media. It is apparent that the Daily mail is one of the few outlets that prints this sort of information. I have never seen a similar feature in the Australian for example. Naturally the ABC would never tell their few remaining viewers about the environmental disaster that is the renewable energy scam. From the digging up of the basic materials through manufacture, construction and decommissioning renewables are anything but. If the general population was ever informed of the damage done they would be horrified, horrified enough to have renewables banned and their promoters put in jail.
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“It is apparent that the Daily mail is one of the few outlets that prints this sort of information. I have never seen a similar feature in the Australian for example.”
Actually Lawrie the SMH published a similar article by Nicole Hasham on January 13 2019. It has taken the Daily Mail just over three years to “print this sort of information”.
As for the Australian, it is far more concerned with getting Morrison elected and denigrating the Lab premiers to have a “similar feature”
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/waste-crisis-looms-as-thousands-of-solar-panels-reach-end-of-life-20190112-p50qzd.html
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Thank you. I do note she only refers to solar panels and not the far bigger problem of wind turbines. No reporter ever talks about the damage done in the production of the useless renewables.
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I wish I’d seen this before Ian. I’ve done this a few dozen times now – every single time someone writes “the ABC will never”, I prove them wrong.
Here we go searching for site:abc.net.au solar waste produces dozens of results (with some being repeats in different regions). Here are 3
https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2022-01-17/are-some-solar-panels-toxic-/100757108
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-07-23/solar-power-waste-landfill-environmental-impact/11336162
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-07/what-happens-to-solar-panels-once-theyve-reached/13376804
Only the Greens have any sort of policy regarding this.
The ABC covers various negative aspects of wind turbines but why am I bothering, Lawrie will not correct himself and will write the same thing again somewhere else. Sheep will be sheep.
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Nice try Fig Leaf, but what you have reported is only a partial coverage of the issue. What about wind turbines? And none of those ABC reports was on live TV News coverage or Four Corners or Q & A or the Drum or Insiders or 7.30 program or AM Radio program or PM Radio program. Why not?
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Seriously? You want me to provide every report on every type of energy source so that you can check if something is missing?
Yes, they report on wind turbines as well. And batteries – you know mining killing and exploiting people and the environment, their toxicity, disposal, fire risk and waste. I’m not sure what area that they have failed to cover that another news outlet does better. Perhaps you can enlighten me?
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Background briefing is part of the ABC investigative unit
https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/backgroundbriefing/giant-wind-farms-clearing-queensland-bush/13670398
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Corporately, we acquired a site in a takeover that used to house a car battery recycle factory.
Because such batteries have Pb (lead) electrodes, we got caught up in a court case with the EPA who made impossible demands for a cleanup to be funded by us, who did not make the mess. (We won).
They ‘other side’ was quite deaf to the suggestion that the battery recycle site did a lot of good. Car batteries have quite concentrated sulphuric acid, which was captured and neutralised. Better than getting in the eye of a child? The lead was melted down and recycled. About then I had to study the literature on lead poisoning. It was as full of fairy stories as the rest of the green grey material that we are getting used to as fanciful. Geoff S
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Wait… PM all the way back in 2005… ABC ahead of the game
https://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2005/s1393191.htm
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2005? 17 years ago? What have they broadcast lately or in the years between 2005 and 2022? And in 2005 that was not in prime-time ABC live TV news was it? That’s my point. Where it is posted on their myriad of TV, radio or internet sites, it’s buried deep in minor platforms. If you watch their live news programs – prime time ABC-1 News or ABC News-24 (one hour of news repeated for 23 hours) they display an obvious editorial bias of uncritically supporting climate change claims, lacking any scientific evidence, and enthusiastically supporting renewable energy stories again without criticism.
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I’ve already responded to this. There is a huge archive on the ABC of what you seek. I also don’t see the “enthusiastically” supporting. Maybe show it.
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Fig Leaf,
I see you don’t dispute my statement that “they display an obvious editorial bias of uncritically supporting climate change claims”. Thank-you.
As for their enthusiasm on renewable energy, that’s in the narrative over the broadcast story where they paint a rosy picture of the renewable project providing lots of clean energy. Most people on this site well recognize that Renewables are a disaster at providing energy security. Try harder Fig Leaf.
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Restore
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Nice Lawrie. You triggered two trolls.
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We directly addressed what he wrote. You came in and added an irrelevant comment that ironically describes what you wrote.
Note that I am now directly addressing your comment. Try harder.
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Ho humm..the usual drivel.
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NO. You’re a poo.
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NO! that name is reserved for me alone!
Capital P would be nice.
00
when you get paid for generating word salad its hard to break out
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Newsflash: troll triggered by being called a troll.
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The button I hit was called reply.
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Kevin
We used to live in a very rural area with bore hole water that had to be pumped up to the taps. I bought a 2 kw petrol generor during one extended power cuts and two things struck me. Firstly how the generator laboured to lift the water up but most of all how it really struggled when we boiled up our electric kettle.
I think it would be good for renewable enthusiasts to be shown the generator power needed for the simple task of boiling a kettle then invite them to take a 100 watt solar panel and see how many more they needed to add in order to boil the kettle.
Then repeat the exercise at night.
Solar power and wind have their place but not as base load power for 24/7 societies.
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I knew of an engineering professor at University of Washington who had his students tie a rope to an automobile and pull it around a flat parking lot. Asked them afterward if $2.50 or whatever the price per gallon was at that time, was a bargain to make that car go 30+ miles down a road at 75 mph.
It’s easy to believe in magic without any experience in how things actually work.
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Kevin
If you are making any sort of representation that is physical or online a good graphic example of the sheer ineffectiveness of the renewable concerned is likely to have a big impact. 20 years after the event I still remember the struggling generator and the reality that solar power would not deliver even with many panels and they would be useless after dark or out of the high season
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TonyB, that 2kw generator would only be capable of about 1.8kw consistently, and that kettle would have taken every watt the poor genny could deliver.
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I too am still wondering how bad things have to get before enough people wake up and stop voting for the clowns. Most likely when it’s too late and we have to learn our lesson the hard way. Still, we have perhaps one last chance at the next federal election. I won’t be holding my breath though.
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Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.” – H.L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy
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In other words we get the government we deserve. Here endeth the lesson.
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“I too am still wondering how bad things have to get before enough people wake up and stop voting for the clowns”
Which clowns are these? Clowns to the Left of us or Jokers to the Right. Those naive enough to vote for PHON or UAP will find they’re stuck in the middle with a couple of total losers going nowhere
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Wow, fourteen songs in just one line!
Tony.
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Stuck in the middle with you. So where are the thirteen Tony? Asked nicely.
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Ian, I don’t believe for a minute that you are anywhere near the “middle”. Stuck with me or not.
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Enough of your off topics as it suits you.
If I am wrong then please correct me item by item.
This is not the first time I have had comments censored here and I am surprised that it has happened so often in recent times.
00
Environmentalism is a religion
Written by Michael Crichton (September 15, 2003)
Today, one of the most powerful religions in the Western World is environmentalism. Environmentalism seems to be the religion of choice for urban atheists.
also:
The main people who seem to have rushed into Environmentalism are those who were formerly Socialist or Communists, in many cases radicals, people who have seen their old beliefs beginning to fall apart in the USSR and in Red China.
They have rushed into the idea of a clean and perfect environment. They have overlooked the fact that industrial countries are the most pollution free countries in the world and that primitive societies are the most polluted. They don’t know that the American Indian was a grave polluter who used to move his camp site only when it became to filthy to endure, who used to burn forests in order to get the game, just as the primitives of the rain forest are burning the forest to get the game in that part of the world. This is a primitive phenomenon. And, by the way, the forests replenish themselves.
Today we have these environmentalists, the Luddites of our time, again, the intellectuals and the snobs and mindless people who follow them ready to destroy everything that has made our civilization under the illusion that these things which produce our wealth are somehow the great evil.
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There is nothing wrong in caring for the environment. The trouble is that caring for the environment and so called Climate Change have become mixed up with each other and are now intertwined. A true environmentalist should be aghast at how solar panels and windmill towers are made (the energy and materials required) and how they need to be disposed of when at the end of their so called “useful” life (land fill, environmental degradation from toxic materials, etc.).
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I am surprised at how few really knowledgeable people there are and how many of them die before they can have an impact on the masses. Crichton, Carter spring to mind.
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“They don’t know that the American Indian was a grave polluter who used to move his camp site only when it became too filthy to endure, who used to burn forests in order to get the game, just as the primitives of the rain forest are burning the forest to get the game in that part of the world. This is a primitive phenomenon.”
That’s the exact same Modus Operandi our Indigenous folk in OZ used to use, when you couldn’t stand the stink and flies, you moved on.
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The problem is really easy for our leaders to deal with:
la la la la la la la la la la la la la la la
LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA LA
It’s how they’ve dealt with every major problem that can’t be exploited for increased political power and control.
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It spans back much further than the present day, go back to 1997 and the UN IPCC Kyoto Conference and “greenhouse gas emissions” reduction agreements for electricity supply beginning of the end of cheap and reliable electricity in Australia.
But earlier the formation of the United Nations after WW2 and soon after the infiltration by globalist leftist groups (Marxist based Fabian Society of the UK from late 1800s and later established in other countries including The Australian Fabian Society) followed by their new world order ambitions and climate hoax politics used to undermine the developed nations, redistribute the wealth, etc.
Australian Labor (Communist faction) Attorney General Evatt produced the plan for the UN to sign as many treaties/agreements with member nations as possible to create for the purpose of getting around the constitutional laws of those nations, an example being the 1975 Lima Protocol-Agreement signed by Whitlam Labor agreeing to gradually transfer most of Australia’s (and other signatory nations manufacturing industry) manufacturing industry to developing nations, like China. And note that the said to be architect of the UN IPCC climate hoax plan was now deceased Canadian billionaire Maurice Strong who was a UN Official who became a very wealthy person. He became a wanted man in Canada, the Environmental Protection Agency were after him for his illegal pumping of fresh water from an aquifer below land he owned and was granted asylum in China where he later died. His cousin was a girlfriend of Communist Chairman Mao Zedong of China. Research the connections and then consider the Russia-China aggression today and how climate hoax is part of the plot. As another UN Official stated during October 2015, Christiana Figureres, climate change is actually about getting rid of the capitalist system (free enterprise for people not on the far left of politics). And replace it with what? A controlled and managed access for comrades only capitalism as the CCP permits?
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Read the History set out in
The Strategic Threat from Net-zero Emissions
By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley
Christopher Monckton is the third Viscount Monkton of Brenchley
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Thank you for that interesting article, ending with ….
“The gallant president of Ukraine and the army of brave citizens now fighting not only for their nation’s right to determine its own destiny but also for their very lives have us, the voters of the West, to thank for their existential predicament. After decades of imprudent self-disarmament aggravated by the global-warming stupidity by which we have long been funding the militaristic expansions both of Putin and of Xi, we are scarcely less at fault for the plight of Ukraine than is Vlad the Invader himself.”
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H/T Peter S open thread – another great article to read
Russia – The Real Backdrop Nobody will Discuss
An excellent article by Martin Armstrong of Armstrong Economics
The press is either totally incompetent at the journalistic level, while the management above is all for the revival of Communism. The press is so left they could never walk a straight line in a DUI test. Even the London Financial Times has turned against the very financial system. They support the overthrow of capitalism and select stories to try to convince capitalists to surrender all their wealth for the good of Schwab’s agenda. We have lost independent news.
All I can say is always look deeper. Those in power ALWAYS want more power. Every way is propaganda. There are two sides to everything and it is about time we STOP killing each other and turn around and just look at those ordering us to fight to the death so they gain more power and wealth. Follow the MONEY!
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I don’t understand the fascination with, and influence of Schwab. Just the look of him would set me into a hightened state of vigilence; and then to listen to his ideas would convince me he is a very naive and dangerous fool.
I have known others like him, though. The WEF is much like many of the “leadership” schools that have sprung up, and sometimes vanished, over the past couple of decades. They attract a lot of talentless and incapable people hoping to find an easy route to advancement, wealth and the esteem of others. Educational leadership institutes have turned out more boobs than Playboy magazine, and have done tremendous damage to our U. S. public schools — turned fools into experts/know-it-alls.
There is no easy path to leadership and no easy path to real expertise. Eschew groupthink is step number one.
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Why not use this information about future waste to factor in the cost of disposal or recovery up-front in the purchase cost and permitting application approvals process? Require the solar/wind/battery manufacturers/sellers/installers to Post an irrevocable bond that matures on/near the projected failure point of their products.
Ignoring the disposal/recovery costs for solar panels, wind mills, and batteries is untenable since the costs are known, now.
That would put a big dent in solar/wind/battery viability.
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Yes. Especially when disposal of waste is one of the biggest arguments against nuclear.
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Lance, such an impost has already been paid by the mining industry to produce the metals required for the manufacture of the material components in these unsustainable-unreliable fads. Its called Financial Assurance (FA). In Qld its an upfront lump sum deposited with an Environmental bureaucracy to ensure mine site rehabilitation upon decommissioning. The more environmental disturbance planned, the bigger the FA.
Theres no such upfront impost on the so called renewable energy sector & no component of rehabilitation factored into their supposed ‘cheap’ $$MWHr supply we hear so much about. The Green hypocrisy is so thick you can cut it with s knife!
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Actually you will need a chainsaw, its too thick for a knife.
60
Not forgetting to also make allowance for inflation – by the time the end of life date arrives, in say 20 years from installation, the original cost estimate for disposal will rise to several times the amount of the posted bond.
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this is, indeed, greens policy. Despite this, it is a very good idea.
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Strange. I have often heard Adam tell us to buy renewables but never once have I heard him tell us that disposal should be paid for or guaranteed to be paid for. Could you post a copy of his policy where that is spelled out?
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I should have added as their policy applies to wind farms and solar farms specifically. I note it applies to household garbage and household goods.
50
Nissan repurposes its old electric car batteries into batteries intended for the home storage of electricity either through buying it at cheap off peak grid rates or if there is surplus power from a home solar panel system. There are companies in the UK set up to sell this integrated system and probably in OZ as well
No idea how effective they are.
Has anyone used an electric car itself to power the electrical needs of a house especially if there is a power cut? That would seem a logical thing to do.
However in the UK they are intending the car should be powered by plugging it into a smart meter so an appropriate financial charge can be made (replacement for fuel duty)
The power from the battery can also be fed back into the grid (stolen) should the grid need it.
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What should be called the perfect solution to a supply problem that didn’t exist before climate hoax?
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What is a battery?
My deep and ancient memory tells me that a battery is a collection of “cells”, probably exhibiting uniformity.
The batteries that we are talking about are employed to store electrical energy. There are many technologies which these batteries use, mostly employing chemical action. I don’t see any of them ever getting much less expensive that they are at the present time.
However the technology which interests me is supercapacitors. These, according to what I have been told, use graphene, an almost magical component which is produced from graphite, which is a mineral form of carbon.
So it seems to me that if the production of graphene could even part way emulate the production of the silicon chip on cost, all other storage technologies would be redunded. The cells in our batteries would be supercapacitors.
40
Should this happen, there might be gnashing of teeth among those who have invested in lithium.
30
An interesting idea tonyb, but the last place I’d want an aging ex electric car battery is in or on my house. Having seen various videos of how quickly they can become an inferno, who would risk having it.
I’ll also be interested to see how insurance companies handle properties with lithium batteries on site, especially refurbished ones, as they gather more data on the things in respect of safety and how difficult they are to extinguish if they catch on fire.
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Glenn
Interesting point. I am not sure insurance companies have caught up with home charging generally, never mind storage of power in large batteries, old or new, adjacent to the house.
Mind you the charging of vehicles directly under blocks of flats woud seem fraught with danger but as yet I haven’t heard it raised as an issue
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Preparing car parks for the risks of charging electric vehicles
70
Ouch – That’s Expensive – EV’s Strike again
Felicity Ace Sinks in Atlantic Ocean
The Felicity Ace car carrier has sunk in the Atlantic Ocean.
The ship’s manager, MOL Ship Management (Singapore), confirmed that the vessel sank around 9 a.m. local time on Tuesday approximately 220 nautical miles off the Azores Islands, citing initial reports from the on-site salvage team.
Salvage vessels will remain in the area to monitor the situation.
The sinking of the Felicity Ace comes nearly two weeks after a fire broke out in the ship’s cargo area.
Reporting has indicated Felicity Ace was carrying around 4,000 vehicles, including some luxury brands like Porsches, Bentleys, and Lamborghinis, along with VW and Audis. The value of the cargo has been estimated to be over $400 million.
Before today, the last photos released of the vessel, published way back on February 18th, showed burn scars from bow to stern, indicating the fire had likely engulfed the entire garage area. The lead photo up top, released today, confirms that the fire did even more damage.
Some of the cars on board were reportedly electric vehicles with lithium-ion batteries that complicated firefighting efforts. Unfortunately with the ship now at the bottom of the ocean, we may never know what caused the initial fire or contributed to its spread.
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Salvage crews and the Portuguese navy had said that the intensity of the fire might be explained by a large number of electric vehicles on board.
Some batteries are known to be flammable and burn at high temperature when they combust, making such a blaze hard to extinguish.
The Felicity Ace fire is one of the first on board a major vehicle carrier loaded with a substantial cargo of electric vehicles. The incident has sparked debate among insurers and regulators about how to safely transport such vehicles, a question that will gain urgency as EVs become more widespread.
While the cause of the fire on the Felicity Ace might never be known because the ship is lying at the bottom of the ocean, experts say there is a danger that batteries in electric cars can short circuit and catch fire. That could mean that precautions not relevant for conventional vehicles might have to be taken into account during transport, regulators said.
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No one has yet been able to report how many EVs actually were on board. .?.
Odd that it should sink so long after the fire went out and the hull was apparently still sound.?
Probably makes insurance claims easier though ?
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Claim: Electric Vehicles are being Shipped in Fire Retardant Bags
h/t observa; Orbital space vehicle re-entry grade fireproofing technology is being deployed to prevent Electric Vehicle batteries from creating another Felicity Ace disaster. My question – when are fire blankets going to be provided to EV owners?
EV fires become hot issue
Maritime operators wrestling with solutions to EV fires as another car carrier burns
By John Mellor on 26th February 2022
The cars on the ship burned with such intensity that parts of the hull above the waterline melted.
According to data provided to Australian fire fighting services, these burning batteries reach temperatures of more than 2700 degrees celsius!
This latest fire on the Felicity Ace is the fourth since, in 2019, the Grande America, a roll-on roll-off vessel with more than 2000 new and used vehicles on board, sank in the Bay of Biscay after the cars ignited. The crew of 26 tried to combat the fire but, within hours, the heat was so intense that it weakened the structural integrity of the ship’s bulkheads and hull. There was little that any of the crew members could do but to abandon ship.
As the industry searches for answers, some operators of car carriers are no longer accepting used EVs and some are also banning accident-damaged used EVs.
One possible solution would be to cover each EV with a special fire-proof blanket at the time an EV is being loaded and tied down to the car deck.
These would have the fire retardant qualities along the lines of those used by Bridgehill car fire blankets which in normal use are unfolded and dragged over burning cars thus containing the fire under the cover.
Some car carriers and ferry operators have already begun equipping their vessels with these blankets.
The blankets are made from similar material to that used on space vehicles to protect them from the intense heat generated on re-entry into earth’s atmosphere.
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“Probably makes insurance claims easier though ?”
Yairs, in the light of long history, it might.
20
I have to admit I made a mistake in previous articles. I thought electric vehicle fires burned at around 2700F (1500C), but if this article is correct, the actual temperature is more like 4900F (2700C).
What house building material can withstand large fire emitting heat of that magnitude? Just looking at a fire that hot can injure your eyes, let alone trying to fight it.
https://premium.goauto.com.au/ev-fires-become-hot-issue/
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The insurance companies must be sighing with relief, not only is there no cleanup bill, the ship has taken its secrets to Davy Jones’ locker.
10
I see MacDonald Homes are throwing in some solar panels and a home car charger in their latest inducement to buy one of their homes. I thought immediately of the advice by some electric car manufacturers to charge them away from the home and the lithium battery fire in Victoria. It cannot be long before home insurance companies add another question-” do you have a car charger and where do you charge your car?”. I heard a caller this AM tell us that her flood cover is $20000 per year. Will there be a premium for in home chargers?
I still think Toyota is streets ahead with their focus on hybrid vehicles. Replacement batteries are about $8000 compared to an all electric at close to $30000.
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Did the sums on a Toyota Yaris Cross GXL 2WD Hybrid vs GXL 2WD based on 8K driving per year
$2,117 extra for drive away – 3.8l/100km vs 5.4l/100km, 1.6l per 100km difference
304l hybrid vs 432l 2WD = 128l per year per 8k = 194.9/l U98 today = $249.472 over 10 years = $2,484.72 = Hybrid saves $377.72 in Petrol over 10 years and no need for replacement battery – however see below
What hybrid warranty coverage do I have on my Toyota?
Hybrid-Related Component Coverage: Hybrid-related components, including the hybrid battery, battery control module, hybrid control module and inverter with converter, are covered for 8 years/100,000 miles. The hybrid battery may have longer coverage under the Emissions Coverage. Refer to your Owner’s Warranty Information booklet for details. Starting with the 2020 model year, every hybrid battery warranty is being increased from 8 years or 100,000 miles, to 10 years from date of first use, or 150,000 miles whichever comes first.
Hello
I’ve have a 2020 new model yaris hybrid. In the last 10 days I’ve had to get roadside assistance twice as the 12v Battery was dead. First time the car had been stationary for 3 days, the second time 2 days. Dealership today checked if there was a electrical fault (no) but said it needed a full charge up, which they did. Issue is – apparently flat 12v Battery is a hybrid issue (due to of engine running from hybrid Battery mainly it doesn’t fully charge the 12v.) Apparently there have been cases of people going on holiday for 2 weeks, coming back to a dead battery. I’m concerned as over the next few months due to work I will be leaving my car a few times for a week or two at the airport.
Seems a serious design fault of Toyota when they have a strong reputation for reliability!
Has anyone else experienced this? Does anyone have a solution? Am thinking I may well be better to sell the car and start afresh.
50
In April 2020, Toyota gave the following advice on Battery maintenance due to cars being left for long periods without use: https://mag.toyota.co.uk/coronavirus-toyota-hybrid-car-maintenance/
It isn’t just a hybrid or Toyota problem, as petrol cars and cars from other manufacturers may be affected as well. For example our 2020 i20 comes up with a Battery drainage warning a few minutes after the engine is turned off and the multimedia unit is still on.
What you haven’t said is whether your normal usage is short journeys, etc. These together with electrical systems like lighting being on a lot, etc, don’t help provide the Battery with a full charge.
Yes, you can sell the car, but may have a similar experience with the replacement – who knows ?
30
That is not a problem … it is a standard warning on most Hyundai’s .
It is basicly just a reminder that the battery is being used whilst the engine is off.
10
Simple solution to the dead battery issue..
Keep a 12v emergency jump start pack in the glove pocket… $100 tops.
Send the bill to the Toyota dealer .
10
There is a whole lot more to it than battery life. Hybrids are much more complex beasts than either ICE or EVs. Should something go wrong with the hybrid you can be pretty much assured of very high costs. Just getting simple things like brakes to operate consistently across all drive modes increases complexity and repair. You may be lucky and just slide through, or not.
60
Using a Tesla as a stationary power source will render the warranty Void. Maybe Nissan is different, but I’d find out first.
https://electrek.co/2021/02/23/tesla-voids-your-warranty-power-your-home-with-electric-car-battery-pack/
As well, the Tesla Powerwall Warranty declines over time. Warranted 60 pct capacity at 10 yrs of age.
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2016/07/02/teslas-incredible-shrinking-powerwall-warranty/
It might be a good idea to check with one’s homeowner insurance agent to see if a Li ion battery fire will be covered by insurance or if the insurance is voided by charging an EV inside an attached garage ( or having a Powerwall in same ).
110
Even if it is covered, there’s the matter of your and your family’s lives to consider. Sometimes the best insurance is not to run the risk in the first place. Premiums are lower too.
130
60% capacity is the point at which the battery’s physics stop working…known as end of life.
30
So Tonyb I understand you’re trying hard to find some pluses for UNRELIABLE,TOXIC S & W energy, but please tell us what difference this idiocy would make if fully complied with by 2030 or 2050?
Would it be 0.0001c or …..? Do I really need to link to the WIKI graph since 1970 or 1990 AGAIN?
50
Neville
To be clear I think the use of weather dependent renewables as base load power for 24/7 societies is nonsensical. However it is not me making policy and we will be bullied further down this route Until even our elite see the problem.
That might be hastened by the events in Ukraine but others see that as a reason to promote renewables even harder.
100
Neville
Incidentally, as far as the UK goes, if we disappeared overnight we would make a theoretical difference of 1/200th of a degree. The equivalent of walking up three steps in your house as temp reduces with altitude.
Our much maligned agricultural sector if it disappeared overnight would make a difference of 1/2000 of a degree.
121
Thanks Tony, I know you’re a rational, clear thinker as you’ve shown us in your replies.
BTW I too hope that the Putin psychopath will suffer from his Ukraine lunacy and I hope it eventually leads to his downfall.
52
Oooo !…
Careful what you wish for Neville. !
Whilst Putin is undoutedly a megalomanic, you have no idea of who , or what philosophy might take his place. !
80
That might depend on how his demise is encompassed.
He seems to have lived by the sword.
40
United States / White House is full of psychopaths; just consider their record for this century alone. It’s a no brainer . . .
60
Geoffrey, for affirmation, not that you need any, see Brandon’s State of the Union Address from last night.
Good news though.
The Pandemic is over. Zero mask virtue signaling.
(SARS Cov2 viruses are all registered Democrats and follow the election with scientifically predictable precision, and are already preparing policy mutations for the next election cycle.)
Russia is the Klan.
The government is going to fix roads and bridges.
Otherwise … war.
Normalcy has been restored after Bad Orange Man.
20
Once upon a time the world’s longest interconnected electricity grid in Australia had reliable coal fired power stations generating most of the electricity working efficiently twenty four hours a day apart from maintenance and repairs downtime occasionally, but because the combined generating capacity of the power stations was in excess of baseload and peak demand, apart from isolated transmission line failures because of weather conditions, bushfires and other natural events, Australians had low electricity costs.
The justification and low pricing was heavy industrial users like aluminium smelters, steelworks, cement producers, suburban rail and tram transport and others, and all consumers benefited. Until climate hoax began and in Australia the transition to renewable (so called) unreliable energy that began after the IPCC Kyoto Japan Agreement was signed for reduction of “greenhouse gas emissions”. That was followed by State Governments privatising the electricity industry assets, in NSW what had been managed by the Electricity Commission of NSW. Before privatisation commenced the NSW State Government (Coalition) closed the Electricity Commission and transferred the assets to government owned private companies to break the union domination and related poor work practises impacting adversely on operating costs. At that time the Sydney Chullora Railway Workshops were closed and the work put out to private sector tender, again poor work practises including at the Chullora site absenteeism of sixty percent of employees on sick leave every day.
Privatisation was planned and implementation commenced by a Labor NSW State Government and by the time Labor was replaced by a Coalition Liberal-National State Government privatisation was well underway and unstoppable. Victoria and South Australia followed. By 2009/10 financial year the Gillard Federal Labor Government had decided to introduce a carbon tax of ten per cent and a renewable energy surcharge of ten per cent, both plus ten per cent GST. And they raised the renewable energy target from about three per cent to about thirty per cent of electricity supply sources.
And now most of the remaining coal fired power stations are planned for closure within a few years time. Of four gas fired generators proposed by the Federal Government for VIC, QLD and NSW only one has received State Government planning approval to date, for the Hunter Valley NSW recently announced. The one HELE coal fired power station proposed for NQLD with Federal Government prepared to underwrite the financing is still awaiting QLD Labor Government planning approval.
The Snowy Hydro 02 pumped hydro project is running years behind schedule and now not expected to be operational before or after 2030 and the cost has increased to around three times the original estimate by the “Turnbull Government” as they named it.
Surely the energy crisis in the Northern Hemisphere in recent years coupled to the Russia and China political situations, including Russia reported now to have been undermining electricity supply in other countries by secretly backing Green groups to oppose gas and coal extraction, to close power stations and replace them with unreliable wind and solar, now being reported by trusted media sources, will finally convince the governments of Australia, because State Governments are responsible for electricity supply and planning approvals for supply and distribution, that this Green climate hoax madness must be stopped?
370
An excellent summation of the mess we are in and how we got here Dennis ! A lot of foolish , lazy and ignorant people assisted in wrecking our energy grid and now we reap what we have sown. To fix it will take a lot of political will, that at present is nowhere to be be seen, and a lot of money.
150
On Sky News recently Mark Latham, former Labor Federal Opposition Leader, talked about his questioning of the NSW Minister Matt Kean about the planned closure of coal fired power stations, battery storage proposed and so on. It became clear that accountant and now Minister for Finance Kean who is also involved in environment is not across the subject of electricity generation and distribution, his only focus is on the politics and renewable energy transition farce.
And I believe this is not unusual, most politicians do not understand the engineering, they seem to be confused about generating and storage of electrify, for example.
300
It seems most politicians do not understand the reason why China and India (and others) are installing coal-fired power stations.
They might grasp that coal is the cheapest method although I think that the constant B.S. that “renewables are the cheapest source of electricity” is more likely lodged in their brain, which is unable to hold 2 ideas at once.
160
I am not an expert on this subject but I have done a lot of research to find out as much as I can about it, accordingly I cannot believe the claim that renewables (unreliable and intermittent operation) are the cheapest source of electricity. And if they were why was/is there a need for special subsidies for profit handed to those businesses? Of course all businesses are entitled to legally minimise tax liability by claiming costs incurred in producing an operating profit, and all businesses using fossil fuel off road are entitled to a fuel excise rebate, that fuel tax is for roads maintenance purposes. However the mines and the power station businesses are not subsidised, the Greens even claim that government owned railways are mine subsidies and ignore the usage charges applicable.
In other words, the claim that renewable energy (what a stupid description) is cheapest, or another claim equipment is getting cheaper) needs to be compared on one of those level playing fields politicians like to mention. No direct profit subsidies and no handicapping of power stations by requiring them to fit into the intermittent supply periods when wind and solar are able to supply. Let’s see the cheapest on a level operating system.
Then consider the vast areas of suitable, emphasis on suitable, land for wind turbines and solar needed just to replace one coal fired power station, consider NSW Hunter Valley Liddell Power Station with four generator units and nameplate capacity in total of 2,000 MW. For comparison purposes consider the NSW Capital Hill wind turbine installation with 67 units and 140 MW nameplate capacity. Land area 15,000 acres/6,000 hectares. Even considering later model wind turbines with more nameplate capacity the land area plus feeder transmission line land is huge.
And then consider replacement of all of the coal fired power stations with wind, solar, ancillary equipment including generators and storage batteries.
90
“Once upon a time…”
The various State Electricity Commissions were created to both standardise the power supply (AC vs DC, voltage etc) and to ensure reliable operation.
In NSW at least, it went for many years as independently financed – that is, it neither cost the State Gov money, nor provided it with money. That changed with the Askin Gov, which appropriated the income and gave them a fixed budget to work with. All down hill from there, from employing/training many more tradies than required, to ultimately privitisation.
As usual, some pollie “found” a source of “income” it could appropriate and didn’t hesitate to do so, as the “downside” costs were well in the future.
And here we are…
50
The only thing that will wake up the Federal, State and Territory Governments is serious rolling Blackouts disrupting Society. That and the Populace picking up their pitchforks.
[Snip. – LVA]
50
I read a report once, can ‘ t remember where, which stated that at the current rate of green expansion of panels, turbines, batteries etc, all known reserves of some of the relatively scarce and difficult to extract and process rare earths would be exhausted by 2030
70
The mining waste from Rare Earth Elements is staggering.
“For every ton of REEs that are produced, there are 2,000 tons of mine tailings, including 1 to 1.4 tons of radioactive waste (Filho 2016).”
https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/KCEP-Rare-Earth-Elements.pdf
90
Tonyb see Mark Mill’s video link below and a transcript is available as well.
30
When it comes to Green economics money is never an issue .
60
“When it comes to Green economics money is never an issue.”
Well, as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said here in the US, all the government has to do is print more money.
60
AGAIN here’s Mark Mill’s accurate video that wrecks every part of their TOXIC S & W narrative.
I’m sure w’ed need many more CHILD slave mining adventures like the TOXIC Congo disaster if or when we were stupid enough to embrace their TOXIC lunacy.
https://www.prageru.com/video/whats-wrong-with-wind-and-solar?playlist=fact-checkers
80
And to clean up after coal? not that it has ever been done so costings are not available.
On the other hand we have endless examples of clean up costs for oil spills, particularly in the USA, just for pipeline spills, clean up was 334 odd million.
Also love the conflation of worldwide estimates of wind and solar cost and the headline which only mentions the USA
135
Well modern power stations have considerable equipment for just that. Fly ash is used in huge quantities as I know when I made an enquiry about availability (around 1990) and was asked how many truck loads do you want? (and those were huge tanker types). Other uses include use in DryWall insulated panels.
Old coal mines are rehabilitated and often planted with vegetation. Are you against that?
The carbon dioxide goes into the air and is used by plants and there is more green growth (according to NASA) as a result. Very useful with an expanding population.
Or are you worried about lead, cadmium and mercury emissions from burning coal polluting the surrounding atmosphere? I remember when this was excitedly raised by an environmentalist chemist about 50 years ago, based on his ACTUAL analyses! It was immediately pointed out that those quantities would have rendered the area for hundreds of square miles around every coal power station uninhabitable. It seems he made a mistake (extraction of pigments from the coloured plastic stoppers he used).
Really Peter, you should wonder about your religious belief that “COAL is Evil and carbon (dioxide) causes sinful warming. Or at the least stop being hysterical about things you know nothing about.
240
Don’t feed the trolls.
20
Peter
Cleaning up after coal mines has been regularly done over here although the task is not complete.
On some of the reclaimed slag heaps wind farms have been built
Ihttps://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2016/nov/15/coal-mines-to-turbines-how-energy-shapes-the-welsh-landscape-in-pictures
51
I spent a few years during the 1970s regularly visiting coal mines around NSW and in particular the Hunter Valley, today the rehabilitated open cut mine sites are impossible to identify unless you know where the mines were located.
170
Sand mining on Bennetts Beach, from Hawks Nest north along the coast, commenced in 1968, resumed in 1971-72, and again post-1986 (D. Stoupe, BHP Titanium Minerals Pty Ltd, Hawks Nest
I remember walking along Bennetts Beach mid 60s and the rutile in the sand burnt you bare feet – now nice white sand that does not burn your feet, and the area was rehabilitated
140
In the early ’80s I worked on mine rehab around the old Howick open cut near Ravensworth in the Upper Hunter.
Once a compartment had been mined, re-filled and formed, reserved top soil was dozed over the area and tough grasses planted initially to stabilise the area from erosion and begin the revegetation process. Native grass seed present in the topsoil added to that vegetation. Later, trees were planted — far more trees than were there pre-mining, the area being mostly open grassland created by Aboriginal burning and maintained by graziers thereafter. Note this was happening from the ’70s onwards.
The conditions on coal mining leases are quite detailed and strict. Where a new compartment was to be cleared for mining, it was subject to vegetation and wildlife surveys. A number of trees greater than that about to be knocked down was planted in another adjacent area.
Each mine employs a resident graduate environmental officer who oversees the whole process. At the Mt Owen mine where I later did some work, about 200 “bat boxes” were placed in trees away from the mine area to re-home any micro-bats about to be disturbed by land clearing/concussions from blasting. This was done in advance of the mining to allow the bats to find their new accommodation before their home-trees were knocked down. The environmental officer there was known to the miners as “Batman”.
I don’t believe any wind turbine monstrosity has a resident environmental officer, nor do I recall wind turbine owners being overly concerned about all the bats and birds they massacre in the name of their Green subsidised profits while their fans are spinning.
As for rehab of wind “farms” — what’s that?????
It should also be noted that there is a serious proposal to leave some open-cuts open for use as additional water storage for the Hunter which has experienced a massive growth in population since its last dam was built. By re-purposing open-cuts for water storage without much additional spending on infrastructure and no screaming from the usual Green idiots, it’s a win-win.
I don’t imagine wind farms can be re-purposed for the public good. Eyesore –art maybe?
120
There you go
https://gullenrangewindfarm.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/GRWF_OEMP_v7.pdf
And while applaud your rehabilitation work, you have neglected to provide a cost estimate
010
That’s odd. This topic is all about rehabilitation.
Wondering if you could please point out the relevant page numbers in the pdf as I’m having great trouble finding it.
How will they dispose of the wind turbines at end of life?
How will they remove the concrete pads?
100
Rubbish Peter!
$1,500 per Wedge Tailed Eagle found DEAD!
$1,500 per Powerful Owl found DEAD!
Found DEAD? Like they’ll ever report that!
$ZERO per bat or any other bird or animal
Surveys for carcasses daily for a couple weeks then every 3 months?
Really? 3 months?
No responsibility for ground water flow disturbance!
Hydrology impact report ZERO!
End of life responsibilities ZERO!
It’s like a free lunch for the parasites investing in and unreliable electricity generator?
This Wind Farm is an environmental MONSTER!
Wedge Tailed Eagle are only worth $1,500 to these massive investors!
They are killers!
140
Alcoa had a coal mine and power station in Anglesea. It was closed in 2015. The power station has been demolished and the coal site is being rehabilitated, with a lake being created with plans for an eco-tourism attraction.
130
The present NSW Coalition Government announced about one year ago that plans were underway to use certain open cut coal mines no longer in operation as water storage lakes for water supply and recreational purposes.
80
that is not restitution – it was high quality farmland not a dirty puddle
012
It is a water storage facility rehabilitation for the land of droughts and flooding rains.
80
Restitution is whatever the involved parties say it is. They are not there to live up to your fantasies.
70
Rubbish!
It was salt flats!
Occasional grazing & a few chooks?
70
Renaturation of a coal mine
Another one
Of course it has been done will be done further, what will you tell us ?
70
A satirical comdedian (Dieter Nuhr) once said correctly in a German TV show:
😀
Source
80
lots of assertions but no figures, Of course when you can either dump or walk away from the problem, or hand wave, then actual numbers are an irrelvancy
018
“Of course when you can either dump or walk away from the problem”
How true that is !
https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/128E7/production/_110770067_globalfiberglasssolutionspic-morewindturbinesabouttoberecycled.jpg
50
Think about how much coal and other fossil fuels have done for human civilisation. Human civilisation would not exist without it.
Why take the backward step to wind and solar that are unreliable, and which on a “whole of lifetime” contribute basically nothing, ending up being a huge impost on the environment and nature from beginning to end.?
There is absolutely no rational or environmental reason for their use.
50
I know I’m wasting my time AGAIN, but even Wiki gets it right sometimes.
Here’s ALL COUNTRIES’ ( in fact the world’s co2 emissions) co2 emissions graph since 1970 or 1990, just take your pick. Does anyone not understand this very simple graph(s)?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions#/media/File:World_fossil_carbon_dioxide_emissions_six_top_countries_and_confederations.png
30
Ah, but Australia is one of those “Other Countries”, and look how bad we are. Repent!
30
Yes Robert Aussies emit a whopping 1.1%, just shocking I know. SARC. And those dreadful Kiwis emit an incredible 0.1%. Jacinda should hang her head in shame.
70
After ‘covid’ number fibbing, and watching the despicable politicization of science and academia involved, my reaction to CO2 emission navel gazing, is that the numbers and charts are probably mostly cr@p.
Climate stats were practice lies for the pandemic lies.
IPCC WHO CDC … garbage.
We don’t even know the half of it yet.
60
Honk: this
On Abraham Lincoln and the Protocols
https://balance10.blogspot.com/2022/03/on-abraham-lincoln-and-protocols.html may not be quite half of it but it serves as a start all right:
31
Damn, the Globalist Left has saturation bombed the middle, and just keep pushing folk into places they don’t want to go, in a desperate search for sanctuary.
10
The Federal Government is backing a national battery recycling scheme – B-cycle; not to be confused with bicycle hiring firm:
https://bcycle.com.au/industries/industry-faqs/
The major Australian stores are involved in this. They ask people to tape a pole of the battery to avoid accidental shorts but I wonder how many will do that.
I noticed an AusPost truck burnt out yesterday. I wonder what started that. Lithium batteries in the mail have to be a fire risk.
Turbine blades are problematic. I wonder how they can find an alternative re-use?
80
Rick,
how about setting them in concrete as barriers against the rising sea levels? We could surround Australia with a wall about 3 metres high. Might make it difficult to use the beach.
90
maybe swoopy looking Armco railing?
00
Metaphorically/symbolically speaking, we could put the blades to use by using them to whack the “behinds” of both major parties until they get the message. Trouble is I doubt there are enough voters who are awake at the next election to do that.
60
I saw somewhere they were using them for pedestrian bridges.
20
The blades are mainly made from Carbon Fibre, Glass fibre, Balsa wood, and epoxy resins.
There are some facilities to shred the blades, burn off the resins etc in a furnace for heating/ energy recovery, and use the carbon and glass fibres as reinforcement in cement !
Unlikely that is is a economical process though !
50
Those from offshore mills can be dropped to form an artificial reef along with the tower structure.
10
Not only uneconomical Chad, but you could bet your left nut that they are not recycled using sunbeams or puffs of wind either.
20
Let’s consider the amount of “stuff” used for each type of generator. (We’ll pretend that a random generator is equivalent to a proper coal or nuclear plant.)
These are some very crude figures to start with. See links for more detail.
For a wind turbine:
https://www.freeingenergy.com/math/wind-turbine-weight-pound-mwh-gwh-m148/
For a 2MW onshore wind turbine:
937kg per MW for weight of concrete.
194kg per MW for weight of turbine assembly.
That’s 1131kg per MW total.
But wind turbines have a capacity factor of about 30% so for a MWh it’s 3770kg per MWh.
But bear in mind a wind turbine only has a life of about 15 years
For a coal plant:
https://www.freeingenergy.com/math/coal-plant-weight-steel-concrete-pound-decomission-mwh-gwh-m149/
A figure of the weight of steel and concrete is about 450 tonnes per MW and a capacity factor close to 100% so it will be close to 450kg per MWh.
But a coal plant can easily last 40 years, so 2.7 times longer than a wind turbine.
Taking into account the coal plant lasting so much longer than a wind turbine, the figure for coal plant over its lifetine becomes 450/2.7 = 167kg per MWh.
SUMMARY:
So for the normalised figures it’s 3770kg per MWh of “stuff” for the wind turbines and 167kg of “stuff” for coal plant.
So it requires 22 times more material to make a MWh with wind energy than it does for coal.
Obviously a more accurate calculation woukd also include associated infrastructure for both types of plant but this gives a rough idea.
Just more good reasons why wind energy is bad.
ADDENDUM
Other figures worth looking at for a wind turbine are:
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7420393
That’s 900 tonnes of steel for 5MW not counting all the other stuff like concrete for the base and masses of fibreglass for the blades.
Of course, all that requires masses of fossil fuels to produce and the calculation for that is there too.
131
Dave:
Don’t you know that Greenies can’t do simple arithmetic?
150
David Maddison
In fairness, shouldn’t you count the coal it uses too?
According to this page that works out at about 400kg/MWh. Bumps your 167 figure up quite a lot, but is still way ahead of the unreliables.
20
The calculation I presented is for the power generating infrastructure that ultimately needs to be disposed of.
If you are going to count the weight of coal burned, then you might as well count the weight of air that goes through the wind turbine, which would be substantial.
It was a rough calculation to show the amount of stuff that ultimately has to be buried or recycled from disposal of the generating plant.
60
As noted above, there is only one party that has a platform that recognises the need to consider the “amount of stuff”. Maybe you should vote for them so that they can legislate.
016
Is that to consider it when deciding to go ahead with projects a la the Greens and coal, or consider it when developing waste disposal policies ?
20
From the beginning to the end. Read the policy.
02
Here’s more REAL WORLD DATA for Chinese life expectancy since 1950 ( 43.5 years) and today in 2021 (77.3 years)and steadily increasing to 2100.
Anyone NOT UNDERSTAND the importance of FOSSIL FUEL energy now? Just to remind you that China is the world’s largest co2 emitter and they’ve reaped another 33 + years of life expectancy since 1950 and still increasing every year.
When will our left wing loonies WAKE UP? Oh and China will not think about so called net zero until 2060 and India 2070. See the delusional Glasgow clown show nonsense.
https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CHN/china/life-expectancy
130
During the 1990s the United Churches held a conference to consider the allocation of church funds and what assets would be needed in the longer term future, speakers claimed that life expectancy was increasing as medical science advances and people have access to healthy food sources and lifestyles. Among the recommendations were private hospitals for mainly day surgery and a small hospital for longer term patients needing treatment after accidents or palliative care, etc., and community living facilities offering cradle to grave accommodation and work opportunities like the Kibbutz in Israel and more.
In short the forecast was for people in the future to have an average age of 100 years and older, 150 years not so distant future and even more later.
60
I listen to a interview with a research Scientist a few days ago.
He spacialised in human cell behaviour and life expectancy.
In brief, he claims (papers published) that we now know how to extend human natural life span to 150+ years ( they have demonstrated the equivalent with mice !) as well as stop/ reverse the effects of ageing diseases such as Alzheimers !
..Biden should be all over this !
50
That was Andrew Sinclair on “conversations”. I knew him when he was working on sex determining genes.
Are you an ABC fanboy?
08
Apologies… David not Andrew. A different person (unless he changed his name).
08
Fan boy ?.. No,.. more a selective listener.
Conversations…depending on who is on
And sometimes the afternoon satire/chat with Josh Zepps
News etc is always avoided or ignored ( too frustrating )
50
For how many of those one hundred and fifty years would a fellow be impotent and toothless?
30
As i recall, his belief was that the cells could effectively be rejuvinated. !…certainly brain cells, memory function, learning ability, etc..
I guess it just depends which specific cell type they target ?
20
We’ve learnt the hard way that anything brought to us by the greens will be poorly thought through and impractical and S&W is the posterchild for that., Snowy II will another.
60
If you mean “we” as us here then yes, at least the vast majority here. I would certainly not go that far for the voting public. More harm needs to be done to their lives to try and wake up most of them. The problem I see though is that Russia is now taking front stage in people’s minds, perhaps deliberately to divert the attention by and large of the non-thinking and sleeping public from what’s next going to happen to continue the removal of our freedoms and rights and pave the way for total subjugation.
50
Snowy II is a Liberal government idea from start to finish. No greens have written any S&W bills that have been passed into law.
010
So what? Both major parties are on a unity ticket wrt reducing emissions to net zero.
40
Ronin wrote, “by the greens”, which was incorrect.
You are all so “anti-green” that you can’t see the trees for the forest.
09
That net energy consuming monstrosity (SH2) was Turnbull’s idea. He was a Green embedded in the Liberal Party. A LINO (Liberal in Name Only), like a lot of them, these days.
(Strictly speaking, the idea predates Turnbull and his handlers by decades, but it was never built because it was correctky judged to be economically worthless by proper engineers and economic analysts.)
60
Turnbull was liberal leader and his party room supported the idea.
210
Regarding economics, I’m sure you are correct as always, but then again the economics of an action decades ago can be completely irrelevant decades later.
17
Very true G A…
..and Snowy 2 almost becomes a necessary evil if the push for more and more W & S continues such that high capacity storage is essential.
But, without W & S it will be a complete joke !
So, in reality , we should blame the AGW /Green movement for forcing it to be reconsidered.
60
Snowy 2 will pump when the coal fired power is least used, and sell when demand is high. Only way it makes economic sense.
It actually helps the coal fired power stations by leveling out electricity demand.
Pretending that Snowy 2 is anything but coal fired power is nonsense.
30
Snowy2 was one of Malcolm’s “thought bubbles”.
30
I doubt Turncoat had any clue as to what Pumped Hydro storage was until some over paid consultant suggested it in a expensive report !
20
Australia could regain manufacturing industry but our Federal and State governments, State Governments have more areas of responsibility and planning powers etc than Federal Government, but there is much they need to fix. Reverse the UN Lima Agreement and Agenda 21 roadblocks, remove the too many red and green tape regulations and compliance costs to businesses, restore the electricity grid with reliable power stations and most cost effectively coal fired and some gas generators maybe.
South Korea has a reasonably high standard of living and produce steel from Australian iron ore and coal, and manufacture many products including ships, so Australia’s high wages could be worked around if the nation became internationally competitive as a manufacturing base.
50
?? ..but but but.. Australias high wages ARE the primary reason manufacturing here is uncompetitive ?
61
No they are one of several factors Chad, I was MD of a large manufacturing company for twelve years and a senior executive in that business for over twenty years, and before that employed in manufacturing industry companies.
I decided against a public company board assisted management buyout of my last place of employment despite it being three times industry average operating profit consistently because of the other factors, we paid employees well above award wages and bonuses based on exceeding annual budget targets, but imported products were becoming more difficult to compete with as the years passed. The company was acquired by a foreign multl-national and they ceased manufacturing here about a decade later.
As I posted South Korea has a reasonable standard of living (including wages) but manages to manufacture many products including steel from Australian raw materials.
60
Good graph here.
https://ourworldindata.org/scale-for-electricity
A sense of units and scale for electrical energy production and consumption
by Hannah Ritchie and Max Roser
November 22, 2017
50
Unfortunately David most Greens etc wouldn’t understand that DATA at all. Or they’d BELIEVE that the right hand blow up section looks about the same as reliable BASE-LOAD power.
Just my experience talking to Greens etc over the years. And asking them to carefully read and then THINK is a hopeless task.
80
Also, what I found surprising is that hydro and nuclear produce even more power than coal.
And even though they don’t produce CO2*, greens hate them anyway because the cheap and reliable power liberates the masses which is sonething they don’t want.
*Actually, greens do complain about CO2 from dams because of rotting vegetation washed into the pondage, but that doesn’t seem a valid argument because wherever the vegetation rots it will produce CO2. I guess that they also don’t know about CH4.
50
Why bury old wind turbine blades when they could be burnt?
40
‘Today’s blades are made from balsa wood which is sandwiched between two bits of fiberglass . The bigger the blades, the more balsa wood they contain. Engineers in the US have calculated that 100m blades need 150 cubic meters (5,300 cubic feet) of balsa wood.’
The balsa wood harvesting is often done illegally and vast amounts of forest are cleared
100
No. Fibreglass is mainly glass and does not burn. It melts above 1000C. But this all costs energy and there has to be a point to the expense.
The bonding resin can burn but likely toxic and that’s a worse disposal problem.
And burning the very light balsa is hardly worthwhile because it is very light, say 160kg/m3, 20% of normal wood so there is little energy there to feed the process. You end up with a gigantic mess of molten glass and toxic chemicals.
I guess turbine blades are not recyclable and buried where they provide no long term threat to the environment. It’s all so silly when these things do not achieve their alleged primary purpose, to reduce or even restrain the growth of world CO2. I would suggest there are now over 500,000 of the monsters.
So we are spending $1.5Trillion a year on medication which does not work and no one noticed that? Double, triple the dose.
110
Why not read a thread before repeat posting a question ..?
Ref #13.
And to repeat the answer …… Uneconomical !
20
Just more proof of the BENEFICIAL rise in GDP since the start of the Industrial Revolution in the UK.
Of course the full graph covers the last 2,000 years, but the almost vertical rise over the last 200 years is as close to a miracle that we’ll ever experience.
OWI DATA is a very useful site to try to understand how lucky we are to be living in the modern era.
BTW Lomborg states that the projected UN data also shows that GDP per person by 2100 will be about 3.5 times higher compared to 2021.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/world-gdp-over-the-last-two-millennia
40
Headline story in the Australian. Ecology gone mad.
“Billionaire piles pressure on big Aussie polluters
Australia’s enormous resource companies are on notice as a new breed of emboldened financial agitators take an aggressive – and often effective – stance on climate accountability“.
So now carbon dioxide, the gas of life from which all life is made is pollution? And it devastates the world’s climates.
We must restore the carbon dioxide levels of 1850 or the world is doomed?
We must control the world climates.
To say this is all nonsense is wrong. It is utterly insane. The fact that it is written as a major headline story shows how far down the path the world has gone.
Forget all the developments in science in human history we now have post modern science where the ridiculous is true, science is by consensus, facts are what you want them to be, gender doesn’t exist and if you identify as a frog, you are a frog.
How do you argue against insanity?
80
And allegedly we need more and more wind turbines, more cash, more solar and to blow up more working power stations and Nett Zero. And anyone who disagrees is evil because we have to save the planet. No matter what the cost! No matter how much real pollution is generated, as long as it is in China.
Never has this been debated, argued, proven. And even in Parliaments and boardrooms around the world, no one is questioning it. No one is measuring the effectiveness of windmills and solar panels. We are having zero impact on CO2 and no one cares because it doesn’t matter. More and more money. Now. Its an emergency.
Forget the moonies and the preppers and the rapture. A form of total insanity has been presented as essential truth. And no one dares say anything. Except retired scientists who are ignored.
60
The Left/Greens love the Chicomms.
The Chicomms love coal.
The Left/Greens are silent about Chicomm coal consumption but want to stop the West using it.
Hmmmm….
60
‘Michael Schellenberger on those green delusions and Putins real politic.
https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/the-wests-green-delusions-empowered?utm_source=url&s=r
90
Who cares, that’s the Greta Thunbergs of this world’s problem and all the student climate change strikers that demand renewables now, goodluck with the clean up kids and the huge tax increases to pay for it.
50
Right about now Great Thunberg and her handlers would be suffering relevance deprivation syndrome.
40
Eventually this waste problem will become a major issue everywhere, but the more immediate issue will be the removal of redundant wind turbines and solar panels and sorting out who pays. In many cases, farmers have allowed these things to be installed on their properties as they can provide a nice rent generator during the 20 year lifecycle. But, I’m guessing that none of these farmers would have realised that it costs up to 500k to remove and dispose of a turbine and the company responsible will likely be wound up, leaving the financial burden on the farmer. This will result in turbines remaining in-situ and becoming serious hazards as the structure rusts and decays. Solar farms will be similar, but the damage to farm land, shaded underneath for 2 decades will be extremely costly to restore, even if you can afford to dispose of the acres of toxic waste.
80
Everyone should read this very quick summary from Lomborg using UN data etc to try to understand their so called climate change.
As I’ve stated above even including so called UN CLIMATE projections people will be 3.5 times richer by 2100.
He includes a lot more historical data for us to THINK about and his team has the maths, economics etc experts to calculate the latest data.
Certainly their Climate alarm is a bigger threat than their so called CLIMATE CHANGE.
https://news.sky.com/story/bjorn-lomborg-climate-alarm-is-a-bigger-threat-than-climate-change-it-leads-to-anxious-lives-and-bad-policies-12067383
60
To simplify the whole business, there is only one piece of data which ever mattered. Not climates, not temperatures, not storms, not windmills or wind farms or electric cars which have created a new class of billionaires.
This graph is 100% of the alleged problem. There is nothing else.
Look at it closely and show the impact of $15Trillion on windmills, solar panels, electric cars, blowing up power plants, increased efficiencies, diode lights or even the near total shutdown of airlines and cars in 2020. See if you can spot any human events like nuclear explosions, world war, massive bushfires or natural events like volcanoes.
And yet the only thing which matters is to halt the growth of CO2. Double, triple, quadruple the number of giant windtowers into the millions and what is the expected result? Nothing. So why is it being done?
Yet now the CO2 reduction industry is the biggest and most pointless industry in human history. It leaves the Great Pyramids of Giza, the Pyramids of the Mayas, the Great Wall of China and the statues of Easter Island far behind in cost and pointlessness. We are now burying the failures and building more.
And what is the concern in newspapers today. To double down on what is not working. No one ever shows this graph because people might start to ask what is the point? Especially of Nett Zero.
We have achieved nett zero. Absolutely zero effect on CO2 levels. So keep spending. Someone appreciates the money. And Twiggy Forrest for example wants his piece of the biggest game on the planet. The fact that it is utterly fake and has no effect is ignored.
60
TdeF I’ve linked to NOAA Mauna Loa many times over the last few years, but the silly Greens will never understand.
Here’s the update to JAN 2022 and shows 418+ ppm and CSIRO Tas would be a little lower.
But I still think that Wiki’s all countries or total world data is the best to try and understand Human co2 emissions since 1970.
https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/
40
Thanks. I will take the time to compare the datasets.
I do not believe for a second that mankind’s output of CO2 is of any consequence. Or of methane, which is the current story to eliminate agriculture.
Maybe these graphs are the key not to proving it, but to making it clear to everyone that the whole thing is a science fr*ud. They do not understand my absolute proof with C14 but the very fact that everyone is silent on CO2 growth proves that they are not interested. After all, the whole story is about controlling CO2 and no one cares if 500,000 windmills make a difference?
50
And Neville, it is not the graphs which are significant really. It’s the idea that no one is interested in CO2 levels. They say we’re all going to die because of excess CO2 but in fact no one cares about CO2 levels.
There are only two explanations for that. Firstly they do not understand their own logic at all. They are just frightened of CO2 as a sort of criminal chemical, pollution.
Or they know perfectly well that CO2 is not a problem and their beef is something else like vegetarianism, meat is murder, milk is prostitution (my favourite), polar bears are so cuddly (try it) or the world is in mortal danger so you have to get into costume, sing songs or mime dying animals.
Either way CO2 levels are of no interest. All that science stuff. What is CO2 anyway? Why not ban it? Greta would agree. After all Greenpeace banned Chlorine. How can an organization ban a member of the Periodic Table? To which the answer is Periodic what?
50
In other words the bulk of the public are science idiots. Especially politicians and journalists. And the bulk of young people are full of emotion and testosterone and easily misled and happy to have a goal in life. And then Climate Scientology can dominate. As it has done.
Tina Turner on Climate Change
Oh-oh, what’s CO2 got to do, got to do with it?
What’s CO2 but a second-hand emission?
50
And as only 2% live below the Tropic of Capricorn, 10% below the equator why are we punishing ourselves? 98% of all CO2 comes from overseas. And most of the rest do absolutely nothing. Why are we indulging in self flagellation? What sort of crazy religion is this?
60
Had a look and you can not see any dips to do with 911, or the 2008 financial meltdown or covid shutdown of nearly everything, that’s an indicator of how much CO2 will reduce by us growing windmills and solar panels.
50
Precisely, but it’s not just that. You cannot see any human activity at all, like giant bushfires in Indonesia, Europe, California, Australia, bushfires which so increased CO2 that phytoplankton blooms were visible across the South Pacific. Even reported by the extreme left Guardian.
Now the Guardian put the blooms down to ‘nutrients’, like ash from the bushfires. But plants like trees do not grow from ash, any more than a 50 ton tree grows from the earth or there would be a big hole around the tree. All plants grow from entirely from aerial CO2 and H2O and ‘nutrients’ are tiny. Trees are really solid wet CO2. As are people. That’s why when dried, animals burn like wood.
However it also means that the CO2 from the bushfires was absorbed immediately! Which is why it does not show on the graph. That busts every premise of man made Global Warming/Climate Change.
The evidence of our eyes is that CO2 is rapidly absorbed. Humans could not alter CO2 levels if we tried. They are set on a planetary scale.
30
Why recycle or bury wind turbines (depending on the part)?
I would leave them in place but write on each blade:
Blade 1: FOLLY
Blade 2: OF THE
Blade 3: GREEN LEFT
40
There was no mistake. Each blade cost $300,000. It was a roaring success.
50
Don’t let them bury their mistakes.
40
They already have. I’m afraid they are also very quickly burying anyone who dares to expose their mistakes. It can be turned around; at the ballot box. Failing that there is a less palatable option but I doubt the public by then would even consider it.
40
Firstly, if my questions have already been asked, then an apology in advance because severely limited time has prevented me from reading every comment in this thread.
My questions are as follows:
Why can’t turbine blades be reused in new devices?
Similarly, why can’t solar panels be refurbished with new cells or whatever the underlying structure is called?
I have often wondered about both matters and except for transportation costs to get the parts back to a factory for reuse, I cannot think of another economic reason to prevent reuse. Happy to be educated if reuse is uneconomical for other reasons?
00
The 50 metre fibgreglass blades are damaged, shredded, delaminated, broken. They are not recyclable.
Solar panels suffer all sorts of degradation. Mechanical, electrical, decay. And again they are mainly glass like the blades, so a worthless material. Only the rare earths are valuable but the cost of recovery is high. A bit like mobile phones. All the fabulously clever smart phones are ultimately just beach sand impregnated with rare earths in tiny quantities. People do melt them down for the gold, of which there is little.
It’s like trying to recover the value of a broken samurai sword. Basically it’s just iron ore at about $1 a kg.
70
Blade recycling ..
https://youtu.be/knX7NkJILhs
Also suggestions that they consider using timber materials instead of carbon/glass fibre construction !
🤔🙄🤪
00
Firstly, apology accepted, but you should read threads if you have a question to ask.
This is the third time in this thread for the same question.
And the answer is always the same…
It COULD be done, but it is uneconomical for both issues ,..blades , and solar panels.
There is a company in Adelaid that strips the aluminium frames and glass from panels for recycling , but the base solar cells are just landfill.
And they only deal with a minor % of waste panels !
50
Wind Turbine Blades are made of fiberglass and/or carbon graphite, + epoxy composites. “Can” they be recycled? Yes. But it usually costs more than the materials are worth. Uneconomical. More energy required than it took to make them originally. The failure modes generally preclude re-use of the blades themselves. The failures are not repairable.
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Wind-turbine-blade-failure-modes_tbl1_306345004
Solar PV panels “can” be recycled, but the materials in them cost 10 times more to recycle than they are worth.
Many things “can be done” but not economically or not practically.
Lead can be transmuted into gold in a particle accelerator, but at USD 1 quadrillion / 28 grams, in electrical costs.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/fact-or-fiction-lead-can-be-turned-into-gold/
50
When I lived in Rockhampton, I was accosted in our Mall (you know how they do that, even as you assiduously try to ignore them) by one of two people who had set up an advertising outlet for renewable energy, and this was about wind power. (I desperately wanted to avoid them, but once accosted, I umm, just couldn’t help myself really)
The opening line from the young person, was ….. excuse me Sir, do you know anything about wind power?
Why yes!, I replied …… what would you like to know? (I think that set him back a little)
After a short time, I mentioned the cleanup at end of life after fifteen years. (oh no Sir, that’s 25 years plus)
Then , his further response in reply was classic. Oh no sir, that’s covered, we just replace the nacelles on top of the poles, and with the newer and bigger power generators, and the newer ones can generate some more than three times the power.
Umm, (I then said) the pole for the old one is 70 metres tall, and the blades for the new one would need to be 75 metres long. Could you explain to me how that would work.
Now a little confused, after a bit he mentioned that ….. Sir, I think you’re wrong there.
I smiled and walked off ….. and umm, he let me!
Old wind plants cannot be renewed with new Units. A whole new Wind plant has to be built, so the old one needs to be rehabilitated. Now imagine the cost for that, and factor that back into the unit cost for the electricity generated by the plant.
Wind power cheap!
Umm, not on your life.
Tony.
200
I don’t know what it is with these people.
In that same Mall (Stocklands Rockhampton) I was also accosted by Solar Power Plant ‘spruikers’, and on two other occasions, rooftop solar panel spruikers, and it must be part of their ‘training’ for the job to open with Hello Sir, do you know anything about …..
I can’t stand talking to them, because (you know, Sgt Schultz) they ‘know nothing’. You can’t avoid them, because you have to walk right past them.
They must see that ‘ignore them at all costs’ look on my face and think of it as a challenge.
I just love seeing that look on their faces, that look of ….. that information has vapour trails attached to it, and when I turn to look back after walking off, that look of ….. utter relief.
(It gives me such joy, and yet, every time I see them, it’s a case of ….. ignore them at all costs Tony)
Tony.
120
I would love to be a fly on the wall during one of those encounters Tony!
20
Their ABC had an expert (???) on this morning yapping about the GLOBAL increase in wildfires and stated that everything’s so much worse today.
This ignorant fool should’ve been challenged but the clueless reporter just agreed and I’m sure their silly listeners would believe it all.
Willis Eschenbach checked the GLOBAL WILDFIRE data and found a big drop since 1900 and has the graphs and sources for proper reference. Australia has also had a drop in fires since 1900 and Lomborg also checked and used the same data.
Here’s Willis’ link and you can check the Wildfires data etc.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/25/wheres-the-emergency/
80
Did they mention anything about the radical environmentalists who are actually lighting those wildfires?
30
Here’s Lomborg’s coverage of Global and Aussie fire myths over the last 120 years and he draws the same accurate conclusions as Eschenbach.
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2020/02/16/bjorn-lomborg-fighting-australias-fire-myths/
50
Off topic a little but Bidens State of the Union address is coming up about now:
Heaven spare me . .
30
It can be seen at:
https://youtu.be/mVIXLQrC9rE
He is uncharacteristically articulate.
I am therefore wondering if it’s a body double, or, alternatively, the video going out on the “live” feed was prerecorded and heavily edited, pieced together from multiple small segments of the speech he managed to get right.
40
Hillary definitely had a double.
40
Did you catch his confusion ,.. refering to Iranians, when he meant Ukrainians !
30
In 2015 the minimum break-even price of a wafer-based silicon cell was $US 1.19 per watt of panel dc rating. Thin film 2017 break-even price was US$0.57/ watt. Recycling cost is presently US$28 per panel (based on 350 watt average size) or US$0.08 / watt.
If the current break-even for thin film PVs is US$0.47/watt, and the material recycling return is 10%, then the normalised material recycling cost is US$0.80/watt.
Without discounting for the mean life of the panel, producing panels fully from those recycled materials would accordingly increase the break-even price by about 150% (all else being equal).
I’m not sure what proportion of that unaccounted cost of the panels should apply to present production, it depends on the the growth rate of the industry and other factors. Nonetheless, there should be appropriate accounting for the net present cost of any mandatory recycling.
20
An American engineering company calculated that based on mean time between faults 100,000 solar panels will have to be replaced EVERY day.
This in a 100% renewable energy country such as the USA.
50
Would be interesting to see the same calculations for Australia.
10
“By 2050, it’s predicted that the world will need to dispose of two million tons of wind turbine blade waste every year. In the UK, the volume already exceeds 100,000 tons per year.”
And lets not forget the cost of transport of the blades and the CO2 emitted as a result as well.
I read on this site a few months ago that the turbines can’t be cut up on site for transportation because of the materials they contain, and some time before that, there was a news article about wind turbines being installed at a site in the Snowy Mountains. The blades were shipped into Bega and transported by truck to the site. Each blade required a truck for transport and because of the length, each truck required escort vehicles front and back, and a police escort. Presumably, if the blades cannot be cut up onsite the the same transport arrangements would apply.
70
That’s about 4 ton a minute!
09
How fast do you think China is turning them out.
40
If the location is farmland with livestock grazing, surely cutting them up onsite could result in the livestock ingesting fibreglass fibres, ending up in the meat consumed by humans. Perhaps not a good idea?
10
Very rough numbers indicate that 2 million tons for blade waste alone, seems an exaggeration. GA’s rough check is a sign.
I did some rough estimates on global fleet(working back from 700GW cap), blade weight etc and to me 2 million tons says you are decommisioning over half the 2020 fleet every year.
00
Interesting words by the journalist “…the hidden cost”
Short operational lifespan – known quantity
No recycle option for turbine blades – known issue
Toxicity of solar panel input materials – known issue
Difficulty/cost of recycling solar panels – known issue
This is from a journo inquisitive enough to actually look. You can imagine how unaware most of them are. I guess it will also be a surprise or a hidden costs when the EV batteries start arriving at of life.
80
That journalist risks being ‘ unpersoned’.
50
15 years & counting challenging the ‘climate con’ & I’ve come to the view that rather than continue to beat up on the ‘Unreliables’ (they’re not listening anyway), we need a different, albeit simple approach to ensure the viability of what is an Essential Service – a sensible Energy Policy to meet Australia’s long term power needs.
An Energy Policy along the lines of the principles below that work from the consumer back; is focused upon availability, affordability & reliability 24/7. An Energy Policy that:
• Is technology agnostic; (Ban on nuclear to be repealed so it too can compete with fossil fuels, Hydro, Bio & the ‘Unreliables of Wind & Solar-PV’s).
• Offers no subsidies; (A level playing field!).
• Requires contractual obligations, executed via AEMO auction inviting generators to bid / deliver guaranteed power outputs over specified period(s) in accord with clearly defined QOS (Quality Of Service) standards.
• Imposes substantial financial penalties upon generator(s) who fail to meet contractual commitments; (Force majeure permitting viz earthquakes, tsunami’s, bushfires etc).
• Bond paid in advance to meet environmental T’s & C’s (land rehabilitation and/or disposal / recovery costs for solar-PV panels, wind turbine blades etc).
• Repeal of Legislation, such as the RET, RERT, Safeguard Mechanism etc (The basis for current Carpetbagger subsidies).
With the right Energy Policy in place, the Carpetbaggers (especially those pushing the ‘Unreliables’ of wind & solar-PV’s) would, I suspect, depart the ‘scene’ virtually overnight, leaving it to those generators with a genuine long term interest in competing on both QOS (via what ever power generation technology they choose) & on price to the benefit of consumers.
Should those policy principles not prove attractive to the current breed of power generators – tough. Re-nationalize the industry & return it to whence it came, respective State Govt’s & be done with it.
Other thoughts?
50
Just cut to the chase and don’t vote for the major parties. It’s not that complicated.
20
Already planning on doing just that – Put the Majors Last campaign..
50
Excellent! Anyone who doesn’t do that is in reality supporting the despot leaders of both major parties, whether they realise it or not. Of course there will be many who knowingly support one or the other major party because they believe what their chosen party is doing is right. Such people are typically ideologically obsessed and ignorant of the facts, not necessarily their fault. That’s why voting ought to be taken very seriously but sadly it’s treated like a joke.
10
That caught my eye and piqued my interest because I’d been led to believe that silicon itself was practically worthless. So I did a bit of Googling (using DuckDuckGo, of course 🙂 ). Silver is worth about $350/pound, silicon is worth about $1 / pound. As I thought, silicon itself is not valuable.
50
silicon is not valuable until it has been purified and grown into mono-crystalline silicon.
I dont know about solar panels, but if they incorporate silicon that has been doped with various metals (gallium, boron, phosphorus, etc), then maybe it would be reasonably economic to recover this and do something with it. then again, maybe it isn’t…
40
It’s pure silicon crystal.
The retail price of a basic one-inch silicon wafer without any special features is about $21 when purchased in quantity.
But if a silicon chip fails, it is now polluted with doping elements and worthless because the cost of recycling is too high involving the removal of very doping chemicals which would seriously compromise reuse.
It is easier, faster and massively cheaper to start with pure sand, silicon dioxide, the second most abundant chemical on the planet.
Pure silicon crystals are produced by heating silicon dioxide/sand with carbon at temperatures approaching 2200°C.
Fundamentally there is no value in turning used silicon chips back to beach sand. We have plenty of sand. If not, Saudi Arabia would be doubly rich.
30
OT I know, but important.
The Pandemic is over in America!
Kamala and Nancy sat behind Brandon in the SOTU address last night WITHOUT MASKS!
It’s similar to old Soviet photos, you’ve got to pay attention to whom are what has been erased.
20
You mean Beria and Molotov behind Stalin.
20
The market is actively pushing towards renewables while the Government tries to block it. You have to wonder what the true motivations are. Look at political party funding, if it wasn’t so opaque.
https://www.afr.com/policy/energy-and-climate/agl-takeover-faces-government-roadblock-20220221-p59y85
05
Simple, The government wants to try to ensure some small amount of reliable electricity supply, while the “market”, in this case a green billionaire, is infected with anti-CO2 ideology, and has zero concern for the well-being of the general public.
40
The “market” is only reacting to the perverse incentives the Government has given the Elites to transfer wealth from the non-Elites.
In a free market, there would be no large scale “renewables”. If the Government removed subsidies and forced purchase of unreliables, they would disappear overnight.
Mandated unreliables are simply a mechanism to transfer wealth from the poor to the rich as is evident by the high and increasing cost of domestic electricity which goes higher the more unreliables are connected to grid, not withstanding endless lies from the Left that the unreliables are cheaper than coal or anything else. Have they never looked at their electricity bills?
The onlyvlegitimate use for solar and wind plant is for niche applications like remote telecommunications facilities or islands where the supply of diesel generator fuel is too expensive or impractical.
30
the rent seekers push it for short term gain
the govt and us citizens then have to live with it
if you pardon the pun , the lights have come on in Germany, France and the UK about what real generation is.
10
Why don’t the two states whose taxpayers have built the highest amount of unreliables (Tasmania and South Australia) give a firm undertaking to only use their interconnectors to export their gigawatts of virginal electricity and cease importing from those dirty brown and black coal fired states.
Come on, show us all how it will work, this should be interesting.
20
Tassie, do not need to import power from Vic,.. they have sufficient Hydro to fully supply themselves.
But Victoria (and SA ) often do not, especially at night when their solar dies,…..so Tassie supports Vic/SA during peaks and nights, then uses some cheap Vic surplus solar power during the days so that it can conserve its Hydro water for the next evening demand from the mainland.
Effectively Tassie is a giant. storage “ battery” for Vic.
…and of course the make money doing it !
But , SA is just a power “leach” currently on Vic,….but they hope to play the “power swap” money game with NSW when the new interconnector is finished
00
Odd then it was such an issue whe Basslink failed. Like most renewable schemes, it works when everything goes right.
00
Such an issue for who ?..Tassie. Or Victoria ?
Tas would loose approx $30,000 per hour that they could not export power..
Vic would be sweating over power shortages for pm peaks etc..
00
[…] America’s National Renewable Energy Lab warns a “tidal wave” of wind and solar was… […]
10
I wonder if Greens/Leftists think the visual pollution of windmills is natural, like trees?
Few Greens actually immerse themselves in nature, they can’t tear themselves away from their inner city soy latte sipping environments, so they wouldn’t know.
As someone who appreciates nature, I am offended by how the countryside has been polluted with vast numbers of civilisation and nature-destroying windmills.
30
Greens/leftists are often inner city dwellers so they must like the concrete jungle. Perhaps the concrete jungle messes up with the thinking and so are blind to the delirious effects of wind farms on the environment. Alternatively, they are just plain dumb. Could be both.
10
I doubt most greens have ever seen or heard a windmill, as they don’t seem to plant them in downtown Sydney ,Melbourne Brisbane, etc.
00
There those in my region that think the Shire is somehow “falling behind” as we dont have virtue monuments lining the hills.
10
As I have always said… apart from wood, there is no such thing as “renewable energy”. Napa valley in California is proof positive of this. The wokes/green trash will need to depend on new deposits of lithium, copper, paladium, tungsten and nickel to keep their fantasy of renewable energy alive.
00