Future of the Australian Electricity Market

[Bushmiller]

Apologies for thread drift...

BobL, thanks for that diagram. Back in the early '60s I bought a set of log tables (remember them) which had, inside the covers, the definitions of many physical quantities in terms of other, basic, physical quantities. I referred to them so often that eventually I learned them, and even, sometimes, understood. However, when I had to use seven digit logs, I somehow lost those tables.
Doesn't matter now, i guess, if so many of them have been re-defined.

OK, you may now resume normal service.

Alex

Bit like this perhaps except we called them "Four Figure Tables" and you can see why from the cover. :rolleyes: Mine date from 1965.

509090509091509092

I have been away from home for a couple of weeks so had no access to ancient hoarded treasures. I only ever used these in exams. Calculators were not allowed.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

This will be very nerdy, but when I can't sleep I do square roots in my head to four digits. :)

I'm unwell :)

[ajw]

Square root of 2 = 1.4142135, 3= 1.7320508

WP, I think we share some common traits.

ajw

[woodPixel]

Its not hard to work out on paper, but the trick is keeping the totals in working memory. It can be quite challenging.

I often fall asleep 😂😸, or if I can't clear my mind this works wonders. Its akin to a meditation.

[AlexS]

Alex

Bit like this perhaps except we called them "Four Figure Tables" and you can see why from the cover. :rolleyes: Mine date from 1965.

509090509091509092

I have been away from home for a couple of weeks so had no access to ancient hoarded treasures. I only ever used these in exams. Calculators were not allowed.

Regards
Paul

They're the same ones I had at school. Must have been the standard issue. Later, at tech, I bought a set that had all the physics info inside the covers.

[Bushmiller]

Never heard of Duck Reach Power Station? Well, this is a little off beat but as we have talked extensively about the methods of storing electricity using other energy sources I thought this might provide a little amusement and some insight.

I think of hydro electric schemes as very fifties, but on a recent visit to Tasmania I came across this station at Launceston and it brought home to me how wrong I was on that score. By the way it is pronounced "Lonceston." :) (Not a great revelation for Tasmanians)

Duck Reach power station is situated at cataract gorge and was commissioned in December 1895. It originally just supplied street lighting in Launceston. It was later enlarged to 2MW! It was destroyed in an extreme flood event in 1929 and rebuilt in 1932. It was closed down in 1956.

This is all that remains today:

509107509111509112509113509115

The turbines in their heyday:

509118

After the 1929 flood

509114

Some technical information describing the tunnelling through 860 meters of rock, which was and maybe still is, considered an engineering feat.

509116509117

Perhaps they shut it down prematurely :wink:.

Regards
Paul

[BobL]

There was a small Hydro power station just south of Pemberton setup in the 1930's which made it the first and only town to be powered by hydro in WA.
I'm pretty sure it only ran 48V system and was primarily used for lighting.
In 1954 the town was finally collected to the south west power grid
I remember playing around in some of the disused houses at the end of our street that had the cloth covered wiring hanging out of the damaged ceilings which were installed as part of the system.
The old dam has been upgraded and now provides water for the town.

[AlexS]

Paronella Park in Qld had the first hydro scheme in that state, just to supply power to the (rather large) house. Just checked, it's been restored and is in use again.

Paronella Park Hydro scheme (https://www.paronellapark.com.au/about/the-park/hydro-electric-plant)

When I worked in Bougainville, I was asked by one of the Bougainvilleans I worked with whether a small hydro scheme would be suitable for his village. We looked at what the demand would be - electric refrigerators were the main thing they wanted, replacement of current small generator capacity plus a few other essentials. A scheme that would supply these was feasible. Then we (he and I) looked at what other things people would buy as soon as they had power available. The capacity of the river to meet this new demand would soon be exceeded.
I understand that there are now several small hydro schemes running to villages, cobbled together from equipment from the mine etc.

[GraemeCook]

Just revisited the costs of installing solar in Hobart. Like many, I use most electricity in the evening when the sun ain't shining.

Current cost of electricity = ~25 cents/kwh,
Current feed-in tariff = ~6.5 cents/kwh.

Conclusion: Currently cheaper to buy from Aurora than to install solar. Its all hydro power so no moral imperative.

Future: I looked at trends in the wholesale price of electricity.

509154

The retail feed-in tariff has been significantly above the avaerage wholesale price for the last three years. This should place further downward pressure on the feed-in tariff. Why would Aurora want to pay 6.5 cents to someone with a solar system when the can buy the same kwh of electricity wholesale for 2.8 cents?

Solar panel prices are still trending downward.
Feed-in tariffs are trending downward and are likely to continue.

Conclusion: Watch and wait.

[Chris Parks]

It seems that every small town on a river in the US had a small dam or multiple dams for hydro electric purposes and saw milling and they are now being removed for environmental reasons, mostly to try and increase fish stocks. Most of these dams go back to the late 19th century, early 20th century but some as late as the mid 20th century. YT has a lot of video of dam removal as well.

dam removal projects 2021 - Google Search (https://www.google.com/search?q=dam+removal+projects+2021&oq=dam+removal&aqs=edge.0.0i512j69i57j0i512l6j69i61.5287j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)

[Bushmiller]

This brings me back to my chorus that every power supply has a flaw. Hydro's weak point is the effect on the rivers downstream.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Here is something to chew on!

Could super-sized heat pumps make gas boilers extinct? - BBC News (https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-60772187)

Holes in the ground for heat.

Since Oz is good at digging holes (we seem to specialise in it) then this would be of interest to our political overlords.... just tell them there is oil, coal or gold down there :;

Ooops, only heat? Whoops :doh:



(title flogged from the lyrics of Blue Sky Mine)

[BobL]

Here is something to chew on!

Could super-sized heat pumps make gas boilers extinct? - BBC News (https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-60772187)

Holes in the ground for heat.

FWIW that form of heat like all geothermal heat is originally nuclear.
Natural Radioactive decay of certain elements with long half lives.

It's interesting to hear how 15ºC in the UK is considered warm. I know a chap who lives on acreage just out of the city who uses the coolth in groundwater to cool his house in summer. I forget the temp of the groundwater but its warmer than 15ºC. He has a copper pipe heat exchanger under the ground water and uses a solar powered pump to bring a loop of water inside the heat exchanger up to his house where he has another heat exchanger and solar powered fan to dump cool air into his house.

[havabeer69]

Here is something to chew on!

Could super-sized heat pumps make gas boilers extinct? - BBC News (https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-60772187)

Holes in the ground for heat.

Since Oz is good at digging holes (we seem to specialise in it) then this would be of interest to our political overlords.... just tell them there is oil, coal or gold down there :;

Ooops, only heat? Whoops :doh:



(title flogged from the lyrics of Blue Sky Mine)


midnight actually filmed one of their videos with a central coast power station in the back ground (i think there's a few other stations in there for "location shots":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAFv2NEE-_c

[GraemeCook]

FWIW that form of heat like all geothermal heat is originally nuclear.
Natural Radioactive decay of certain elements with long half lives. ...


Some 20+ years ago, when most heat pumps only worked efficiently when the ambient temperature was above 5°C, I looked seriously at installing a geotherman heat pump to heat the house and hot water. With the then level of technology they were about 1 - 1.5 COP units more efficient than other heat pumps (COP of 5 vs 3 to 3.5).

At ten metres below the surface in Hobart, the ambient temperature is 15°C winter and summer - it is the average annual temperature for the area, according to BOM. Near the surface the temperature fluctuates with the seasons, but by 10 metres it is stable.

The proposal was to drill one or more holes with total length of 150 metres, insert closed heat exchanger pipes, and bliss!

The heat pump, heat exchanger and installation would have cost around $10,000 then. But our house is built on dolerite and the drilling cost was quoted at $30,000 or so. Ouch!

It was very efficient using engineering or scientific criteria; definitely not so using financial criteria.

[woodPixel]

Its vaguely tangential to the discussion, but I felt it was worthy.

In Canberra (here!) it often gets blistering (35 but sometimes >40°) and freezing (~-5° to -10).

While these are bragging extremes, they do occur every year. Most of the time it is fairly pleasant (Id guess 25 to 27, with 15 nights).

Heat pumps make a LOT of sense.

About 10 years back I was yarning with a fencing guy (who was, unsurprisingly, putting up a fence) and I noted the size of all the yards combined was HUGE. I enquired why all four houses, in the conjoining corner, wouldn't drill a deep hole for a heat pump and "pipe" the air to each home, somewhat independently.

Sharing would reduce the capital cost.

Air coming out would be 15° and this could fill the houses in summer and take the chill out in winter. As BobL has pointed out a million times, the cost of running a motor for air movement is trivial.

15 in summer would be BLISS... 15 in dead winter means the heater doesn't need to be on.

The cost savings over 4 houses would be HUGE.

I'm now in new units. Every one of them has an reverse-cycle aircon .... some people run them continuously. Its annoying AF.

What a TRAGIC lost opportunity to pump ground heat into 100 units. The cost savings would be HUGE.

[BobL]

Its vaguely tangential to the discussion, but I felt it was worthy.

In Canberra (here!) it often gets blistering (35 but sometimes >40°) and freezing (~-5° to -10).

While these are bragging extremes, they do occur every year. Most of the time it is fairly pleasant (Id guess 25 to 27, with 15 nights).

Heat pumps make a LOT of sense.

About 10 years back I was yarning with a fencing guy (who was, unsurprisingly, putting up a fence) and I noted the size of all the yards combined was HUGE. I enquired why all four houses, in the conjoining corner, wouldn't drill a deep hole for a heat pump and "pipe" the air to each home, somewhat independently.

Sharing would reduce the capital cost.

Air coming out would be 15° and this could fill the houses in summer and take the chill out in winter. As BobL has pointed out a million times, the cost of running a motor for air movement is trivial..

Its not just an air fan - you do need a water pump as well, but still cheaper than running a compressor pump.

I know of another interesting system that does not even use an underground heat exchanger and that is the Gravity Observatory at a place north of Perth called Ginginr.
The Gravity Discovery Centre - Gingin & Perth (https://gravitycentre.com.au)
The entire air conditioning system for the visitor centre and the observatories (including a very large lab with the gravity laser interferometer arms that has to run at extremely even temperature) are run using groundwater of which there is heaps.

The cool underground water is drawn by a pump up to ground level and put through a heat exchanger and then just let drain out onto the very sandy soil outside the observatory where it quickly trickles back under ground. Its not something that can be done is a suburban setting but anyone on acreage can probably do this.
The savings especially in summer are quite significant

[woodPixel]

Geothermal plants could solve America'''s lithium supply crunch (https://www.fastcompany.com/90735227/geothermal-plants-lithium-boost-ev-battery-industry)

[Bushmiller]

AGL shuts down the first unit at Liddell.

After 50 years of burning coal to generate power, Liddell power station wind-down begins - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-01/liddell-power-station-closure-wind-down-coal/100957890)

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

A background piece on the proposed Eraring shut down.

Switching off: Inside Eraring power station as staff come to terms with its closure - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-03/inside-eraring-power-station-coal-electricity/100953694)

[Beardy]

Bit of a curveball but given current world events and the impact of relying on other countries to supply critical services ( like Germany with Russia)
How do you feel about reliance on lithium batteries given China’s control of the worlds resources to manufacture them?

[BobL]

Bit of a curveball but given current world events and the impact of relying on other countries to supply critical services ( like Germany with Russia)
How do you feel about reliance on lithium batteries given China’s control of the worlds resources to manufacture them?

That's bold statement especially give the following Li Ore reserves graph. OK ore is one components but its one of the most important.
509760
I'm more concerned about REE tech (for magnets) which is way more complicated than Li for batteries. BTW Aus does pretty well on REE ores as well.

[havabeer69]

A background piece on the proposed Eraring shut down.

Switching off: Inside Eraring power station as staff come to terms with its closure - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-03/inside-eraring-power-station-coal-electricity/100953694)



“I remember walking in and goin’ oh, there’s a fair few weirdos here. A bit of a hangover from the Electricity Commission,”

pretty accurate description of the electricity commission workers


will be interesting times for the other coal plants, with liddels unit turning off (and the rest no doubt moth balled as well) and then a year or so later Eraring doing the same thing thats 4000Mw of possible power out of the grid in 3 years.

[Beardy]

This was the article that got me thinking

Risky business: the hidden costs of EV battery raw materials | Automotive World (https://www.automotiveworld.com/articles/risky-business-the-hidden-costs-of-ev-battery-raw-materials/)

[BobL]

In 1982 I read a Time Magazine article that said the world was going to run out of copper by 1994, and Oil by 2000. Calculations were based on "known" reserves.

Recently I came across this (also based on "known" reserves").
Now copper is not running out till 2040?
It seems theres a lot more to find than we think about.
509770

[Bushmiller]

Bob

That chart seems to emphasise the need to step up recycling, certainly for some commodities.

Regards
Paul

[BobL]

Bob

That chart seems to emphasise the need to step up recycling, certainly for some commodities.

Regards
Paul

Correct, our general attempts at recycling are improving but still pretty much rubbish.
I am also reminded of the following story.

SWMBO's grandfather arrived in WA in the early 1920's and retired on a small farm just out of Perth. Unfortunately he lost his retirement savings in the late 1920s and he took up a gold mining lease at Bamboo Creek , ~70 km out of Marble Bar, from 1929 to 1939.
He and his wife and 2 kids lived in a corrugated iron shack and they had to cart water daily using a yoke and 2 kero tins from a creek 300m away.
Despite that they did OK as he managed to send his two kids to boarding schools in Perth and buy a house in the city.
The mine was a one-man operation, hole in the ground with tunnels following quartz veins with a bucket and hand windlass to raise the ore to the surface - in other words very hard work at the hottest place on earth,
By 1939 he was in mid 60's with deteriorating health issues and to follow quartz veins he'd had to go deeper and needed more people. He had the money to finance a modest mine expansion but the problem was the war had soaked up any spare people so he walked off the lease. He died about a decade later.

The lease lay dormant for 10 years before it was taken up again by a well known mining company and sinking the mine further produced several million pounds and the dollars a year net profit from 1950 to 2009. Then someone decided t0 look at how much gold was in the tailings, For a $250 million dollar investment in a large tailings processing plant there was $27 BILLION dollars worth of gold to be recovered.

As for any gold, as a kid SWMBO wore a gold bangle made from gold from the mine, which had to be cut off her arm when she had her wisdom teeth out as a teenager. Her mum (my MIL) had the cut bracelet melted down to make a few bibs and bibs for her granddaughters - SWMBO did not get any. When MIL passed away a few years back MIL left all her jewellery to SWMBO and amongst that lot there was a pearl ring that belonged to her grandmother which apparently was made with gold from the mine. She wears it every day.

[Bushmiller]

Bob

That is such a lovely, emotional story full of pathos.

Regards
Paul

[BobL]

Bob

That is such a lovely, emotional story full of pathos.

Regards
Paul

Yeah or just sour grapes :)
OTOH, if SWMBO's grandpa has made a fortune from the mine the chances of me meeting SWMBO as a teacher at a country high school would have been close to zero.

[GraemeCook]

In 1982 I read a Time Magazine article that said the world was going to run out of copper by 1994, and Oil by 2000. Calculations were based on "known" reserves. ...

Those articles per-date 1982 and usually involved a "noted scientist" who took the then known ore reserves and divided it by the then current world usage and produced a finite date when that commodity would be exhausted. Commodity traders assisted with the publicity - it stirred interest and sales.

Interestingly, economists generally got a lot less excited by these doomsday prophets. They had a simple little formular:
S = f(P)
Supply is a function of price. Increase the price and previously uneconomic mines become profitable, abandoned mines can be re-opened, existing mines can be extended, tailings can be reworked, recycling becomes more attractive, substitutes get invented, etc.

Back in the late 1970's Saudi oil minister, Sheik Zaki Yamani, as head of OPEC, unilaterally raised the price of oil and caused the first oil shock. Governments were outraged; French President de Gaulle was particularly affronted and vocal - "... holding the world to ransom when you just pump the stuff out of the ground." Yamani's response was: "You are absolutely correct, Monsieur President, and we have a special deal for France. We will sell you unlimited quantities of oil at exactly the same price that you sell us mineral water."

The price of oil has changed a little since then.

[russ57]

I remember a lecturer i once had.(1985).
He said, ask me when oil will run out. So, we asked. He said 20 years.
He said, ask how i know. So, we asked...
He said, in Warsaw uni, in 1930, they told me that oil would run out in 20 years. In 1950, in the us, they told me oil would run out in 20 years. In (somewhere), in 1970, they said oil would run out in 20 years.
So it is clear, everyone agrees that oil will run out in 20 years...

[BobL]

I remember a lecturer i once had.(1985).
He said, ask me when oil will run out. So, we asked. He said 20 years.
He said, ask how i know. So, we asked...
He said, in Warsaw uni, in 1930, they told me that oil would run out in 20 years. In 1950, in the us, they told me oil would run out in 20 years. In (somewhere), in 1970, they said oil would run out in 20 years.
So it is clear, everyone agrees that oil will run out in 20 years...

Fusion is the same.

Many metals can extracted from seawater (just need cheap energy - Fusion right??) , and apart from oil and gas theres 70% of worlds crust the has not really been looked at for minerals.

[woodPixel]

A few years ago I had dinner with a Texan oil engineer and his wife. We discussed oil, naturally. There is a near infinite quantity - its only the matter of price to extract it.

At $2 a litre, no so much left, at $20 a litre, plenty.

Curiously I was interested in ethanol/methanol production. Turns out Manildra here is one of the very biggest (https://www.manildra.com.au/product/ethanol/). A casual chat with them revealed they are more than able and capable of producing as much ethanol as needed at an energy price point BELOW fossil fuels right now.

It would be curious to know what the future holds.

[BobL]

A few years ago I had dinner with a Texan oil engineer and his wife. We discussed oil, naturally. There is a near infinite quantity - its only the matter of price to extract it.

At $2 a litre, no so much left, at $20 a litre, plenty.

Curiously I was interested in ethanol/methanol production. Turns out Manildra here is one of the very biggest (https://www.manildra.com.au/product/ethanol/). A casual chat with them revealed they are more than able and capable of producing as much ethanol as needed at an energy price point BELOW fossil fuels right now.

It would be curious to know what the future holds.

It would be interesting to know how much wheat would be needed to replace Austraiia's petrol using ethanol.
My understanding is that on world wide scale to replace liquid fossil fuels fossil fuels the limit is the amount of water and space required to grow the crops and leave enough left over the grow crops for food.
Crops like corn use huge amounts of water.

I was also amused by Mandrila's clim "GMO-free wheat as feedstock", does it really matter?

[Chris Parks]

It is generally agreed that the fuel from crops idea often proposed is not feasible at all. The only reason NSW mandated 10% was because Manildra lobbied the government and convinced them that Manildra would make a ton of money and therefore it was a good idea. The tin pot refinery they have at Nowra couldn't even be considered to produce more than a trickle of Ethanol that would be required if a major move to synthetic fuels was made.

[ian]

Curiously I was interested in ethanol/methanol production. Turns out Manildra here is one of the very biggest (https://www.manildra.com.au/product/ethanol/). A casual chat with them revealed they are more than able and capable of producing as much ethanol as needed at an energy price point BELOW fossil fuels right now.
Not sure about the lifecycle CO2 reduction "efficiency" of ethanol produced by fermenting wheat, but in the US ethanol is mainly produced from corn and this video America Was Wrong About Ethanol - Study Shows - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-yDKeya4SU) suggests that, in the US at least, the CO2 emmissions from corn based ethanol production is no better than those from gasoline, and potentially 24% more than those from using gasoline

[woodPixel]

It would be interesting to know how much wheat would be needed to replace Austraiia's petrol using ethanol.
My understanding is that on world wide scale to replace liquid fossil fuels fossil fuels the limit is the amount of water and space required to grow the crops and leave enough left over the grow crops for food.
Crops like corn use huge amounts of water.

I was also amused by Mandrila's clim "GMO-free wheat as feedstock", does it really matter?

I believe the input of non-gmo is due to a fair chunk of the ethanol being used for grog or sanitiser.

As for water, it would be VERY interesting. Wheat is just the plant of choice. I'm aware of HEMP crops being used too.

Hemp is amazing. It grows so fast it's a weed :) plus it grows many crops a year.

Its bet the only reason Manildra use wheat is due to being primarily a flour producer.

Yes on Manildra being evil. Reading the Michael West media site covering Dark Companies, its clear this country has a cosy political relationship with kleptocrats.

As for other comments on sustainability.... Maybe we will have no choice. Climate change is getting a bit too real.

[GraemeCook]

... Curiously I was interested in ethanol/methanol production. Turns out Manildra here is one of the very biggest (https://www.manildra.com.au/product/ethanol/). A casual chat with them revealed they are more than able and capable of producing as much ethanol as needed at an energy price point BELOW fossil fuels right now. ...


Now ethanol has three different names in popular usage:

ethanol,
ethyl alcohol, and
vodka.

It seems such a waste putting it in a car!

[ian]

Now ethanol has three different names in popular usage:

ethanol,
ethyl alcohol, and
vodka.

It seems such a waste putting it in a car!I believe ethanol is also known as grain alcohol ;)


but look on the bright side Graeme
If you put ethanol into a car you only pay fuel excise of 22(?) cents per litre (the temporarily reduced rate) -- the excise used to be 44 c/l
If you drink vodka -- which I though was made from fermenting potatoes -- you will be paying something like $20 per litre tax

and if you use it in the tractor, the tax is NIL.
.
.
.
BTW
I thought ethyl alcohol was the highly purified version of ethanol that didn't attarct any tax because it's a laboratory chemical

[AlexS]

During WW II ethanol was produced from sugar cane at Sarina in Qld.

[Bushmiller]

Described as the holy grail of electricity generation (probably owing to the similar mythical or unobtainable prospects of the ecclesiastical garment) nuclear fusion has been a carrot dangling on a line for fifty years of more and like BobL's finite oil reserves always twenty years away. So this is the latest from Oxford university:

Nuclear fusion is achieved through new projectile fusion technique (msn.com) (https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/techandscience/nuclear-fusion-is-achieved-through-new-projectile-fusion-technique/ar-AAVRWZJ?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=308f22b28f824e8e94263f588e9daf77)

Interesting, but don't expect a 2000MW facility to come online anytime soon. They still have not reached the point where there is more output than input. That is not a reason to stop looking. I sometimes quote a line from a Thom Gunn poem:

"At worse, one is in motion; and at best,
Reaching no absolute, in which to rest,
One is always nearer by not keeping still."

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

During WW II ethanol was produced from sugar cane at Sarina in Qld.


Doesn't CSR still produce ethanol from molasses at Sarina?

I remember visiting Sarina in the 1970's; it is on the banks of a little river which was in quite disgusting condition because of the discharge of effluent from the distillery.

[GraemeCook]

https://www.woodworkforums.com/images/icons/icon1.png Fusion (Nuclear) Described as the holy grail of electricity generation (probably owing to the similar mythical or unobtainable prospects of the ecclesiastical garment) nuclear fusion has been a carrot dangling on a line for fifty years of more ...


And their predecessors, back in the 1950's, were saying that nuclear fission was absolutely safe and that there would be plants evrywhere "in twenty years" producing electricity so cheaply that it would not be worth the costs of metering.

Note: fission is the reverse of fusion.

[AlexS]

Doesn't CSR still produce ethanol from molasses at Sarina?

I remember visiting Sarina in the 1970's; it is on the banks of a little river which was in quite disgusting condition because of the discharge of effluent from the distillery.

Not sure if they still do, but the plant was certainly in existence in 1970 - not sure if it was working or not then.

[Bushmiller]

I came across a few statistics in diagram form that I thought may be of interest: Basically the largest power installations around the world for various categories. Firstly, the largest power stations overall.

510005

It should be noted that while the Three Gorges Dam has the potential to produce thee most power, in practice the Itaipu Dam in Brazil produces more MWs per year.

Hydro, Natural Gas, Wind and Nukes:


510006

River Hydro, Pumped hydro, Solar and Biomass:

510007

Shale Oil (yuk), Geothermal and Peat:

510008

Australia, not unsurprisingly, does not feature anywhere in these stats, although if Hazelwood Power Station was still open, it could have been included under the Peat category (actually it burnt brown coal, which is not too dissimilar: It may be the same) and at 1600MW (8 x 200MW units) would have been the largest in the world. If there had been a "dirtiest category," it would have topped that list also.

Regards
Paul

[havabeer69]

whats a real eye opener is that the largest coal plant in china is probably chewing around 80,000 tons of coal a day if its running flat out, that's more then some coal ships can even supply.

[Bushmiller]

whats a real eye opener is that the largest coal plant in china is probably chewing around 80,000 tons of coal a day if its running flat out, that's more then some coal ships can even supply.

Agreed

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I heard a radio broadcast a few days ago, which I thought was mainly accurate (there were a few things I might contend, although not enough to go to war over), but I could not remember the title or who the presenter was so it took me a while to track it down. Matt Bevan is the presenter and early on in the podcast he quotes a man by the name of Professor John Bokris. Back in 1973 this man highlighted the issues the third rock from the sun was going to have in forty to fifty years regarding Carbon Dioxide: Fifty years ago makes that right now!

AUSTRALIA | S06 E8 - The 49-year-old energy prophecy that is finally coming true - Australia, If You’re Listening - ABC Radio (https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/if-youre-listening/energy-prophecy/13837650)

I don't know about Bokris being a professor. He may have been a prophet. The podcast moves on from there and the Bokriss mention is only a brief reference pointing out the relative timeframes for awareness of problem caused by CO2. Other people are also asked when they first became "aware."

I think it is well worth a listen.

Regards
Paul

[russ57]

Hazelwood Power Station was still open, it could have been included under the Peat category (actually it burnt brown coal, which is not too dissimilar: It may be the same) and at 1600MW (8 x 200MW units) would have been the largest in the world.
Although the well known authority Wikipedia advises peat is the origin of brown coal aka lignite, brown coal is a much higher grade fuel (still not very good though. ) Hazelwood was not a peat burning plant. Loy yang, also a brown coal plant, has 3.4MW capacity, but there are 2 lignite stations in Germany of higher capacity.
Russ

[GraemeCook]

... I don't know about Bokris being a professor. He may have been a prophet. ...


You may be prone to understatement, Paul! An extremely brief summary:

Born in South Africa, 1923,
Educated, Brighton technical School, Johannesburg,
PhD, Imperial College, London, at age 22,
DSc, Imperial College, London, at age 29.

On faculty of:

Imperial College, London,
University of Pennsylvania,
Flinders University, South Australia,
Texas A&M University.

Authored 700+ journal articles and 24 books.

Bernhardt Patrick John O’Mara Bockris (5 January 1923 – 7 July 2013)
John Bockris - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bockris)

He apparently did some brilliant science earning a Faraday Medal (1981) and attracted controversy earning an IgNobel prize (1997)!

[Bushmiller]

Graeme

Yes, PHD by 22 years of age means he was a clever lad and went on to be most prolific in his writings. Thanks for the extra info.

Regards
Paul

[NeilS]

Graeme

Yes, PHD by 22 years of age means he was a clever lad and went on to be most prolific in his writings. Thanks for the extra info.

Regards
Paul

The DSc at age 29 is also very impressive, which are awarded in recognition of a 'substantial and sustained contribution to scientific knowledge' beyond that required for a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)' and more typically granted mid career.

Only know about those because my FiL had one of them after his name.

Did have one ancestor who matriculated to university at age 12 then dithered while doing his Baccalaureate, Masters and PhD and wasn't appointed to a professorship until he was 20yrs old!

In comparison, his father was a bit slower off the mark not completing his two PhDs and being appointed to a professorship until he was 25... :rolleyes:

It's a shame how diluted DNA becomes many generations later...:U

[AlexS]

About 7 years ago I met an Australian in America who had gained entry to Melbourne Uni to study medicine aged 15. His parents reckoned he was too young and made him take a gap year. When I met him he was a 'retired' professor in the USA, but was still involved with the childrens' hospital that was founded in his name.

[NeilS]

About 7 years ago I met an Australian in America who had gained entry to Melbourne Uni to study medicine aged 15. His parents reckoned he was too young and made him take a gap year. When I met him he was a 'retired' professor in the USA, but was still involved with the childrens' hospital that was founded in his name.

That is the problem with the precocious. They are ready for the academics but do not necessarily have the maturity to take on the responsibilities after graduation.

My own brother, also a retired professor now (a pioneer in transplant surgery), was too young when he first graduation and then had a year treading water before he could be registered to practice.

But, they still manage get where they are ultimately going ahead of their peers and we are all the beneficiaries of what they contribute.

[FenceFurniture]

I heard a radio broadcast a few days ago, Matt Bevan is the presenter and early on in the podcast he quotes a man by the name of Professor John Bokris. Back in 1973 this man highlighted the issues the third rock from the sun was going to have in forty to fifty years regarding Carbon Dioxide: Fifty years ago makes that right now!Yes, extraordinary that he had the measure of it so accurately, so early. What's even more extraordinary though, is that Bokris then floated off with the pixies. I didn't listen to the podcast, but I read Bevan's article on him (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-13/professor-john-bockris-predicted-a-climate-and-energy-crisis-dec/100949208). After moving to Texas he descended into Alchemy, trying to convert Mercury into Gold, along with much work on cold fusion which is still a non-starter – maybe it will remain that way (Mercury is still Mercury too). This is all covered in the last section of that article.

Perhaps he should have retired by 1980?

[Bushmiller]

Brett

So many denialists have pointed out how good CO2 is and that plants consume it: True, but a bit like fertiliser, you can have too much of a good thing particularly if yesterday you removed the plants. This is what I extracted from lecture:

he explained that humans were now producing carbon dioxide at a faster rate than it could be absorbed by plants through photosynthesis, and so it was building up in the atmosphere.
"Now, it can be shown that that does unfortunate things to our atmosphere," he said.
<aside class="_2X-83 g1U-R _1VIKT" data-component="Pullquote" style="box-sizing: border-box; auto; font-size: 1.25rem; line- 2rem; margin- text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: abcsans, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif;">"To put it very briefly, it makes the climate change."

This comment seems quite familiar and the conservative right (and others) have not learnt much in the ensuing fifty years.


The transport minister at the time, Peter Nixon, said Professor Bockris's proposal was not viable.
"It's just not clearly possible to find the sorts of money that Professor Bockris would like for solar energy at this time," Mr Nixon told the ABC's AM program.
"Professor Bockris is pushing his own barrow.
"I doubt the feasibility of Australia to take the lead over countries such as the United States in the area of solar energy."
John Bockris responded angrily, accusing the government of only being interested in talking to fossil fuel lobbyists, and taking a "supine attitude" to solar research.

It is a shame his later career fizzled in comparison.

Regards
Paul


</aside>

[AlexS]

I was a student at Flinders Uni (Earth Science) at the time Bockris was there. I don't remember him, but they did develop an electric car at that time. I'm pretty sure they didn't have an engineering faculty at the time, so as a chemist, he may have been involved in its development.

[NeilS]

<aside class="_2X-83 g1U-R _1VIKT" data-component="Pullquote" style="box-sizing: border-box; auto; font-size: 1.25rem; line- 2rem; margin- text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.5rem; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: abcsans, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif;">
It is a shame his later career fizzled in comparison.



As the saying goes, there is only a fine line between genius and madness...

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/only-a-fine-line-between-genius-and-madness-study/articleshow/5071954.cms

</aside>And, while off on this tangent, a little dyslexia might be safer. Some well known dyslexics include Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Leonardo da Vinci, Pablo Picasso, Richard Branson and Steve Jobs.

https://www.smartcompany.com.<wbr>au/people-human-resources/<wbr>linkedin-dyslexic-thinking-<wbr>official-skill-richard-<wbr>branson/ (https://www.smartcompany.com.au/people-human-resources/linkedin-dyslexic-thinking-official-skill-richard-branson/)

[GraemeCook]

... Some well known dyslexics include Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Leonardo da Vinci, Pablo Picasso, Richard Branson and Steve Jobs. ...


Interesting, and there is certainly a lot of information on this topic.

When my wife was a graduate student in the States in the 1980's she had a part time job in the University Library and for three years she was one of the curators of its Einstein Collection. She says that Einstein's hand writing, in both German and English and a little in Yiddish, as the neatest that she has ever seen. She describes his personal letters as extremely caring and very nuanced, though in English he occasionally used German grammar and spelling conventions. She says that she detected no lingering signs of dyslexia. But then she only has doctoral level knowledge in behavioural science, and is very careful to note their "late diagnosis" and that he may have overcome the issues.

[NeilS]

Interesting, and there is certainly a lot of information on this topic.

When my wife was a graduate student in the States.... she was one of the curators of its Einstein Collection...She says that she detected no lingering signs of dyslexia....

Thanks Graeme.

Yes, this is the nub of the problem with trying to retrospectively diagnose someone with what is a 'clinical diagnosis' that hadn't even been developed during Einstein's lifetime.

If anyone wants to go off on this tangent to the Electricity Market topic of this thread (yes, I know, I'm the culprit), according to Fernette Eide, co-founder of Dyslexic Advantage, the short answer to whether Einstein was dyslexic is "we really don't know".

For more on this see her post in the following link and in particular her inclusion of material about his style of visual thinking from an Orton Society paper.

Dyslexia: Was Albert Einstein dyslexic? - Quora (https://www.quora.com/Dyslexia-Was-Albert-Einstein-dyslexic)

Apologies for taking this thread further off topic... so I will leave it at that and if anyone wants to pursue it further perhaps they can start a separate thread...:)

[Bushmiller]

I suppose that with the forthcoming general election and the populace demanding statements on climate change as well as security in the region, the subject of electricity supply and cost was bound to rear it's ugly head. This article outlines some of the issues:

Slow move to renewable is spiking power prices for households (thenewdaily.com.au) (https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/2022/04/29/power-price-spike/)

I have some questions and concerns about this but before I get into that, the premise is that wholesale prices have averaged a 141% increase for the first quarter of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021. I wouldn't dispute that. I did find it strange that when questioned the Prime Minister blamed the situation in Europe for the price spikes (actually SWMBO thought the comment had been made by the Labour party), but I fail to see the relevance. Solar, wind and hydro do not have a fuel that is dependant on Europe. Coal fired stations burn rubbish quality coal mined in Australia that is never ever exported. The only possibility that I can see for a European influence is if gas prices have gone up because there is more of a demand for our product overseas. If that were the case, and I don't believe it is, it would be the last nail in the the already fully constructed coffin that gas is a way to clean energy.

Even more surprising is that nobody has apparently called this one out!

Back to the article linked above. These are the the flaws in the article I would point to:

1. There is an increase in price of ~ 141% compared to the 2021 quarter. It is still higher than Q1 2020, but not so much and it is less than Q1 2019.
2. It is the first time in years that I have seen QLD prices the highest.
3. QLD has more solar power than almost any other state, but not the most as a ratio to total demand. That falls to South Australia, but they would be in extreme difficulty if they did not have the Victorian interconnector.
4. The statement was made that we need more renewable energy and that is probably true, but not in isolation and not without sufficient corresponding storage facilities.
5. Blame was laid at the feet of the coal fired power stations for pushing the price up. What did these nut jobs expect when they went to a competitive market? If there is a dearth of toilet rolls the price goes exponential. Excrement is not the only "shirty" business.
6. "The best response to breakdowns at old coal fired generators is to replace them more quickly than planned," said independent economist and Climate Council member Nicki Hutley." Replace them with what? More renewables that don't function at night or in calmed conditions or during a drought?
7.Professor Mountain said " We only need one megawatt of storage for every megawatt of solar and wind." I would contend that it is the other way around and even that is a vast understatement. I would be most interested to know how that is going to work. Also we need to talk in megawatts per hour and not megawatts for one hour (or maybe two hours), which is the extraordinary small capability of the existing storage batteries.

There is probably a little more that has been spoken of that I might contest, but that will do for now.

We have to understand, and when I say "we" I mean "they", that the whole dynamic of electricity generation in Australia has turned on it's head. Peak demand has gone about face. Whereas high demand was once during the day with peaks at breakfast and in the evening, high demand is now at night time. But, the peaks of breakfast and early evening fall outside the prime sunlight hours. The wholesale price of electricity on a sunny day is negligible. It is virtually being given away. In fact, if the solar companies did not have some form of subsidy in guaranteed prices, they would have gone down the tube. New solar installations are probably not eligible for any guarantees so there is no real market for people coming to the grid for the moment.

There is now only one problem and that problem is how to store electricity. Until that problem is solved we cannot move forward and the continued installation of more solar power will cease.

Until that time the thermal stations have to continue unless the unthinkable happens and we are prepared to go without power from the grid for up to three quarters of the day (and completely on cloudy days).

A sobering thought for people and until a government is prepared to divert funds to R&D for this problem I don't see how it can be resolved.

Looking forward to people's thoughts on this.

Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

Storage is certainly the problem of our time. In the longer term the solution will be driven by the market and mass production would makes batteries cheaper, I'm sure, because that mass production will inevitably lead to new discoveries and techniques. This is the sort of project that needs huge Govt backing to get it rolling, get past the current inertia. Perhaps put things like Sports Rorts etc on hold for a wee while, as we develop what could and should be a world leading industry. Some serious Govt backing would also push through some of the current boundaries in battery tech development – so many different projects underway that are showing real potential.

To say that one megawatt (per hour or otherwise) needs to be replaced with another is also a little short sighted by whoever it was. To mitigate global heating we need MUCH more electricity generated to electrify everything we possibly can. Coal burning is only part of the problem – a big part, to be sure – but cars and other transport, and other uses of gas are the elephant in the room. I don't know what the attributable figures are but they have probably been mentioned in this thread somewhere.

[Beardy]

Question
Lets say the world turns to battery storage as the go to replacement for motor vehicles and general power usage. Can enough batteries be supplied and how long will this resource last?

[Bushmiller]

Beardy

I suspect battery storage may only be an interim measure (say, twenty to thirty years?) and more likely hydrogen fuel will take over. However, that is pure speculation on my part and is not even close to viable until hydrogen is produced only from renewable sources. Once in place it could be used for many applications.

Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

Lets say the world turns to battery storage as the go to replacement for motor vehicles and general power usage. Can enough batteries be supplied and how long will this resource last?I don't think that batteries will be the total solution for transport because batteries of any kind are probably going to be heavy and/or bulky, and therefore somewhat self defeating. Also, in the period that we still have fossil fool vehicles (20 years until they have no resale value at all?? Less than 20??) there will be an increasing number of EVs of course, but also increasing tech to go with them. So presumably battery demand will increase while hydrogen is being sorted out, and then decrease. I suppose it's very likely that we might have a series of different hybrid vehicles for a while, to counteract vehicle redundancy. What I mean by that is engines that can run, or be easily adapted to run, on different fuels as they come into play. Similar to Gas & Petrol engines of the last 40(?) years. The last thing someone wants to do is to buy a vehicle that is going to be useless and therefore valueless 5 years after purchase.


I suspect battery storage may only be an interim measure (say, twenty to thirty years?) and more likely hydrogen fuel will take over.For transport I think you are dead right Paul. There are too many parts of the planet where an EV would be useful for a few hours before you are buggered. Simpson Track, much of deepest darkest Africa etc. Then you have commercial airliners, sea freighters etc. They will have to be hydrogen powered (or nucular :roll:), I am sure.

However, is there any getting away from batteries for solar (et al) power? (maybe that's not what you meant – just vehicles) One way or another, renewables are all going to begin with solar, wind, wave and whatever else, so we can then produce green hydrogen which is far more compact for the purposes of fuelling transport in all its forms. Nor do I see getting away from household batteries for a good long while yet – not sure I want a hydrogen combustion engine banging away down the back!

All of the above is why I think manufacturers should be making hydrogen powered vehicles now, using Blue hydrogen, so that the transition into Green H is utterly painless for the vehicle owners, and the suppliers of fuel to the punters (Servos). I think I am correct in thinking that the only thing holding back Green H is investment? There are no big secrets to crack are there? How much worse is Blue H than using the same fossil fuel in vehicles? The pollution is at least all in a much smaller number of places for capturing, rather than spread out all over the place in billions of individual vehicles.

[Beardy]

Beardy

I suspect battery storage may only be an interim measure (say, twenty to thirty years?) and more likely hydrogen fuel will take over. However, that is pure speculation on my part and is not even close to viable until hydrogen is produced only from renewable sources. Once in place it could be used for many applications.

Regards
Paul

So do you go down the path of battery with all its limitations, required infrastructure and perhaps short lifespan or head straight to hydrogen and reduce its emissions as we move forward?

[Beardy]

I am on an American based car forum and EV’ s are discussed often. There is a very strong vibe coming from the yanks, particularly now with the Ukrainian events that they are not interested in anything that will make them reliant on other countries.
Fossil fuels are the way to go for them as they maintain control over the source, Germany has been put in a particularly vulnerable situation as an example

I don’t know how widespread that sentiment is though??

[FenceFurniture]

There is a very strong vibe coming from the yanks, particularly now with the Ukrainian events that they are not interested in anything that will make them reliant on other countries.
Fossil fuels are the way to go for them as they maintain control over the source Well they can only retain real control over the fossil fuels that they have within the USA. They have plenty of coal as I understand it, but I don't know about their oil reserves these days. I'd not be surprised to learn that they are importing a considerable amount.

Is there something about EVs or batteries, or components thereof that they are concerned about? Lithium supplies, etc? I can't see any reason at all why the USA wouldn't be able to jump into Blue and then Green H.

[Beardy]

Well they can only retain real control over the fossil fuels that they have within the USA. They have plenty of coal as I understand it, but I don't know about their oil reserves these days. I'd not be surprised to learn that they are importing a considerable amount.

Is there something about EVs or batteries, or components thereof that they are concerned about? Lithium supplies, etc? I can't see any reason at all why the USA wouldn't be able to jump into Blue and then Green H.

As I understand it they have plenty of oil supplies but choose to use everyone else’s at the moment, lithium is a problem for them so are reliant on others for supply

[Beardy]

China Dominates the Rare Earths Supply Chain - IER (https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/international-issues/china-dominates-the-rare-earths-supply-chain/)

[FenceFurniture]

Hmmm. Not so much oil in the USA.

510895

They're pretty good for coal:
510896

Lithium is not too good:
510897

[Bushmiller]

However, is there any getting away from batteries for solar (et al) power? (maybe that's not what you meant – just vehicles) One way or another, renewables are all going to begin with solar, wind, wave and whatever else, so we can then produce green hydrogen which is far more compact for the purposes of fuelling transport in all its forms. Nor do I see getting away from household batteries for a good long while yet – not sure I want a hydrogen combustion engine banging away down the back!

All of the above is why I think manufacturers should be making hydrogen powered vehicles now, using Blue hydrogen, so that the transition into Green H is utterly painless for the vehicle owners, and the suppliers of fuel to the punters (Servos). I think I am correct in thinking that the only thing holding back Green H is investment? There are no big secrets to crack are there? How much worse is Blue H than using the same fossil fuel in vehicles? The pollution is at least all in a much smaller number of places for capturing, rather than spread out all over the place in billions of individual vehicles.

Brett

While I was primarily thinking in terms of mobile transport for hydrogen power and in particular larger machines such as ships and planes, I also see that the H2 fuel could power the grid generators at night (not so much your 3KVA beast down the back of your block). :)

The types of hydrogen or rather their method of production has become quite controversial and the pollies seem to delight in trotting out "colourful" catch phrases. I suspect you may actually be thinking of "grey" hydrogen :rolleyes: ! grey H2 is produced by using natural gas, which those of us that have been following this thread know is a fossil fuel with a carbon intensity of between .6 and .8 depending on how efficiently it is utilised (modern coal fired stations are between .9 and 1.2 depending on their age and level of technology, which is pretty much a euphemism for efficiency). Blue hydrogen goes a step further and captures the CO2 emissions from the natural gas as the hydrogen is produced. Unfortunately the process of CCS (carbon capture and storage) emits even more CO2 gases than if the gas had just been burnt. As such it is a nonsense of the first order. Carbon Capture and Storage is being trialled n many places (including at my own power station, Millmerran) to prove the technology, but that does not mean it is a viable option unless something dramatically changes. For the moment all these installation are pilot plants.

I do agree that one of the keys to the energy issue is investment in research, which has not only been not been forthcoming in recent years, but has been calculatedly scaled back. In fact I would argue that not only has encouragement into new technologies fallen down, it has been actively discouraged. That is at least partly a consequence of the privatisation of the industry (even the government owned stations have to abide by the commercial regulations, theoretically at least) and something of which both sides of politics have been guilty. If it seems that the liberal party is more guilty, and they do seem to be that way, it is really only because they have been at the helm more often. If I may continue the nautical analogy, it seems quite obvious they have not noticed the wind has changed.

They are heading for the doldrums.

Regards
Paul

Edit: a link to the "shades" of H2:

What is green hydrogen vs. blue hydrogen and why it matters (cnbc.com) (https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/06/what-is-green-hydrogen-vs-blue-hydrogen-and-why-it-matters.html#:~:text=Green%20hydrogen%20is%20when%20the%20energy%20used%20to,chemical%20reaction%20occurs%20creating%20hydrogen%20and%20carbon%20monoxide.)

[Bushmiller]

[QUOTE=FenceFurniture;2278506]Hmmm. Not so much oil in the USA.

510895

They're pretty good for coal:
510896

Lithium is not too good:
510897[/QUOTE

One of the issues not so often mentioned is exactly how accessible these reserves are. Early oil drilling may have cost one barrel of oil for every hundred barrels obtained. Today oil is not found so easily. The other extreme is shale oil where it may cost one barrel of oil for every three won. Even coal has a ratio of overburden excavation compared to tonnage recovered irrespective of whether it is underground or open cut.

This is not quite the comparison I was searching for, but maybe explains why some countries import despite having their own reserves.

What it costs to produce oil - CNNMoney (https://money.cnn.com/interactive/economy/the-cost-to-produce-a-barrel-of-oil/index.html)

Regards
Paul

Edit: changed the typo of ration to ratio and added overburden: previously confusing.

[woodPixel]

I feel green hydrogen is huge. Tech to rip it from the air and tech to hydrolyse water are super advanced.

I saw one tech that did both of these things with amazing efficiency (I think I posted some of these above)

Rolling these out bigly will mean stupendously huge storage for our after-hours doings.

As oil prices climb due to war, depletion and chaos, these solutions become vastly more economical.

Fancy a country, blessed with abundant land, sun and ability getting stuck on something like solar power!


edit - on Lithium, I read an article about the Salton Sea in Calif recently that I cant find now. Apparently the resources there are MINDBOGGLING.

[woodPixel]

This isn't directly related, but it's highly tangential...

From seawater to drinking water, with the pus | EurekAlert! (https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/951208)

20 watts of power per liter and it's self cleaning.

This unit is designed for portability and produces 300ml per hour using a tiny portable solar panel. The paper and discussions with the guys shows this thing can scale up to city desal size and use a fraction of the power....

This is excellent. Factor this into the "where do we get all the fresh water for...." Storage/farms/humans/hydrolysis/etc.... This might form part of that puzzle.

Edit - the paper Just a moment... (https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.est.1c08466?ref=pdf)

[Chris Parks]

I feel green hydrogen is huge. Tech to rip it from the air and tech to hydrolyse water are super advanced.

I saw one tech that did both of these things with amazing efficiency (I think I posted some of these above)

Rolling these out bigly will mean stupendously huge storage for our after-hours doings.

As oil prices climb due to war, depletion and chaos, these solutions become vastly more economical.

Fancy a country, blessed with abundant land, sun and ability getting stuck on something like solar power!


edit - on Lithium, I read an article about the Salton Sea in Calif recently that I cant find now. Apparently the resources there are MINDBOGGLING.

Hydrogen to point of storage is one thing, Hydrogen distribution and storage in use is another ball game not yet resolved in an economical manner when applied to transport. When it comes to Hydrogen in transport there are two different methods at this time in history, use it to fuel current ICE technology which is already low efficiency losing about 65% of the fuel used to heat and mechanical inefficiencies or using it to power fuel cells which then means the vehicle is a BEV so why go to all that bother when electricity is far easier to distribute and can largely be obtained via known and easier to manage methods such as hydro, solar etc. TTTT I doubt if any of the boof heads in Canberra understand Hydrogen at all and think of the fuel as they do LPG or natural gas as do a lot of people who listen to them and believe what they hear. Hydrogen has a lower calorific value than petrol and add that to the inefficiencies of an ICE and things don't add up at all when compared to batteries in transport, cars or trucks using ICE technology. Stored and used without having to distribute it appears to have some potential according to some pundits out there but at this point of time I am not sure what. I am sure things will change for all the alternative sources of energy for transport but that is a few years ahead yet. The biggest problem using BEV and static storage is the battery manufacture, sourcing of materials and the end of life disposal methods and that is going to be a huge issue.

[GraemeCook]

... I have some questions and concerns about this but before I get into that, the premise is that wholesale prices have averaged a 141% increase for the first quarter of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021. I wouldn't dispute that. I did find it strange that when questioned the Prime Minister blamed the situation in Europe for the price spikes ...


That article was also run by the ABC.
Wholesale power prices soared 141 per cent, year on year, and households should brace for more - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-29/power-pain-as-bills-tipped-to-rise-40-per-cent-on-surging-prices/101023488)
It didn't seem to make sense as renewals production should be at a peak in the March quarter - nice and sunny - so I put on my economists hat and tried to analyse the figures. This raised so many questions that I initially dismissed the article as inept journalism - a non-numerate journalist writing about something that they did not understand. Later I went back to the source ducumentation - and could not find it! The smell increased.

The Australian Energy Regulator publishes a lot of reports on the energy markets, but intriguingly have not yet published the first quarter of 2022; their stats stop at the end of 2021.
Quarterly volume weighted average spot prices - regions | Australian Energy Regulator (https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistics/quarterly-volume-weighted-average-spot-prices-regions)
The wholesale prices increased dramatically between Q1 and Q2 of 2021 in Queensland and NSW - no idea why - and do not yet have data for 2022 Q1.

510948


But there is an election in the air; is there a correlation?

[GraemeCook]

... I feel green hydrogen is huge. Tech to rip it from the air and tech to hydrolyse water are super advanced. ...


I beg to differ. Hydrogen is an odourless, tasteless, colourless gas; how the hell are you going to paint it green?

Had an interesting discussion on this topic recently with a bunch of engineers - all solar energy zealots - and they were all unimpressed with the future of hydrogen unless there is some radical discovery. Their arguments basically come down to some simple points:

Production of hydrogen by electrolysis is extremely energy intensive meaning that it is expensive.
Hydrogen does not liquify like LPG and it does not disolve into another substance like acetylene. It is thus very bulky to store and transport.
It is very volatile.


SUMMARY, at existing levels of science and technology:

Hydrogen is to expensive to produce,
It is to expensive and too dangerous to ship, and
It is to expensive and too dangerous to store.


Is the hydrogen debate yet another political diversionary ploy?

[ian]

I suppose that with the forthcoming general election and the populace demanding statements on climate change as well as security in the region, the subject of electricity supply and cost was bound to rear it's ugly head. This article outlines some of the issues:

Slow move to renewable is spiking power prices for households (thenewdaily.com.au) (https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/2022/04/29/power-price-spike/)

I have some questions and concerns about this but before I get into that, the premise is that wholesale prices have averaged a 141% increase for the first quarter of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021. I wouldn't dispute that. I did find it strange that when questioned the Prime Minister blamed the situation in Europe for the price spikes (actually SWMBO thought the comment had been made by the Labour party), but I fail to see the relevance. Solar, wind and hydro do not have a fuel that is dependant on Europe. Coal fired stations burn rubbish quality coal mined in Australia that is never ever exported. The only possibility that I can see for a European influence is if gas prices have gone up because there is more of a demand for our product overseas. If that were the case, and I don't believe it is, it would be the last nail in the the already fully constructed coffin that gas is a way to clean energy.

Even more surprising is that nobody has apparently called this one out!

Back to the article linked above. These are the the flaws in the article I would point to:

1. There is an increase in price of ~ 141% compared to the 2021 quarter. It is still higher than Q1 2020, but not so much and it is less than Q1 2019.
2. It is the first time in years that I have seen QLD prices the highest.
3. QLD has more solar power than almost any other state, but not the most as a ratio to total demand. That falls to South Australia, but they would be in extreme difficulty if they did not have the Victorian interconnector.
4. The statement was made that we need more renewable energy and that is probably true, but not in isolation and not without sufficient corresponding storage facilities.
5. Blame was laid at the feet of the coal fired power stations for pushing the price up. What did these nut jobs expect when they went to a competitive market? If there is a dearth of toilet rolls the price goes exponential. Excrement is not the only "shirty" business.
6. "The best response to breakdowns at old coal fired generators is to replace them more quickly than planned," said independent economist and Climate Council member Nicki Hutley." Replace them with what? More renewables that don't function at night or in calmed conditions or during a drought?
7.Professor Mountain said " We only need one megawatt of storage for every megawatt of solar and wind." I would contend that it is the other way around and even that is a vast understatement. I would be most interested to know how that is going to work. Also we need to talk in megawatts per hour and not megawatts for one hour (or maybe two hours), which is the extraordinary small capability of the existing storage batteries.
Paul
I have a slightly different interpretation of most of what you say.

With the influx of renewables onto the Australian electricity market, the price of renewable (solar and wind) electricity has fallen to near zero -- during the main sunlight hours -- which in turn is making coal based electricity generation uneconomic. Your power station has to burn coal at near full capacity for around 10 hours per day, and loses a boat load of money while doing so, and then in the morning and afternoon peaks, those gas burning "bastards" -- aka peaking generators -- jump in and run their gas turbines for a couple of hours per month stealing what little profit you might otherwise make.

So coal is rapidly exiting the market place -- what you expect in a privatised competitive market -- and being replaced by gas fired stations.

But there's a war between Ukraine and Russia -- oops my mistake, Russian has a "special military operation" underway in Ukraine.

The "war" has driven up the oil price -- it's now north of USD $100 a barrel.
The spot market for gas is based on the spot market for oil -- but gas is priced in Giga Joules (energy delivered), while oil is priced in terms of volume (barrels).
It is the spot gas market that is important as no gas powered electricity generator is going to enter into a long term gas supply contract -- aka take or pay -- if they only need the gas supplied for a couple of hours per month. So the gas required will be purchased on the spot market.
The current spot gas price is about 2.5 times what it was 12 months ago. (USD $2.996 vs USD $7.244)


So straight off there is part of your answer.

The war in Ukraine has driven oil prices northwards and they have dragged the spot gas price with them.

[ian]

I beg to differ. Hydrogen is an odourless, tasteless, colourless gas; how the hell are you going to paint it green?

Had an interesting discussion on this topic recently with a bunch of engineers - all solar energy zealots - and they were all unimpressed with the future of hydrogen unless there is some radical discovery. Their arguments basically come down to some simple points:

Production of hydrogen by electrolysis is extremely energy intensive meaning that it is expensive.
Hydrogen does not liquify like LPG and it does not disolve into another substance like acetylene. It is thus very bulky to store and transport.
It is very volatile.


SUMMARY, at existing levels of science and technology:

Hydrogen is to expensive to produce,
It is to expensive and too dangerous to ship, and
It is to expensive and too dangerous to store.


Is the hydrogen debate yet another political diversionary ploy?
without directly addressing your last point, I say "piffle" to your three main summary points.
and as a consequence, who really who cares about whether hydrogen is "another political diversion"


For me the main issue with establishing a large scale hydrogen economy is a smallish thing known as "hydrogen embrittlement" of carbon steel piping and the fact that most steels will leak hydrogen.
Using existing natural gas infrastructure to distribute hydrogen -- is for me more than a little bit of wishful thinking -- I have not heard a peep about the risk of hydrogen embrittlement in high pressure gas lines.
And thinking back to 2nd year uni, I seem to recall that the toughness requirements for the steel used for high pressure gas supply pipes will not work high pressure hydrogen supply lines.


Not that I would ever accuse an Australian politician of not telling the truth, especially during an election campaign.

[GraemeCook]

without directly addressing your last point, I say "piffle" to your three main summary points.
and as a consequence, who really who cares about whether hydrogen is "another political diversion" ...


And I say "piffle" to your comments!

Are you really suggesting:

Hydrogen is cheap to produce,
It is cheap to ship,
It can be transported safely,
It is cheap to store, and
It is safe to store?


Your comment about "hydrogen embrittlement" seems consistent with my argument.

[ian]

something else I wanted to comment on ...

If the Australian electricity market is to convert to a mix of renewables and storage, rechargeable batteries won't cut it.
To guarantee the lights stay on -- something I suggest is a must -- Australia needs to be able to store grid scale power for around 72 hours.

At a rough estimate Australia currently uses 200 terawatt hours per annum. Allowing for the increase in usage driven by population growth and the increase in usage required to fully decarbonise the economy by 2050 -- I've seen estimates suggesting a three fold increase in electricity demand -- the demand for storage comes to about 5000 gigawatt hours. A Giga is 10^9, most power generators are rated in Megawatts 10^6, or the "number of homes" they can power.


Paul,
If I recall correctly, the power station you work at is rated at 500 MW.
So, if I have the proportions right your station would need to run flat out for 10^4 hours -- say 14 months -- just to charge the storage battery.

[ian]

And I say "piffle" to your comments!

Are you really suggesting:

Hydrogen is cheap to produce,
It is cheap to ship,
It can be transported safely,
It is cheap to store, and
It is safe to store?


Your comment about "hydrogen embrittlement" seems consistent with my argument.Graeme

perhaps I should have included an appropriate emoji somewhere in my screed.

but back to your points

hydrogen is cheap to produce -- as long as you use electrolysis and "free" day-time solar power
hydrogen is cheap to ship -- as long as you build specialised ships (Toyota, or is it the Japanese govt, have a trial ship in use today)
hydrogen can be transported safely -- as long as you know about hydrogen embrittlement (I strongly doubt if the words "hydrogen embrittlement" have ever been mentioned in the hearing of any Australian politician), and apart from this forum who else who, doesn't work in a related metallurgical field has heard of the term?
hydrogen is cheap to store -- well "cheap" is really a relative term. Do you mean "cheap" in the context of the alternative of heating the entire planet by an average of 3 degrees and relocating most seaside communities? Or do you mean cheap in the context of the price of petrol before the Covid pandemic and Russia invaded Ukraine?
hydrogen is safe to store -- as long as you follow the required safety protocols. Hydrogen burns with a colourless flame so to detect a hydrogen fire you need to place a combustible material, like a straw broom, in the flame.



So yes, for me the issue of hydrogen embrittlement is the killer MUST SOLVE issue.


When I was writing my screed, I was thinking about the local (to me) Alberta politicians who are currently touting the conversion of Alberta's gas infrastructure into a nation-wide hydrogen gas distribution network, and thinking to myself


Hydrogen is so light and hard to contain that using an existing gas pipeline seems to me to be pure madness.


so, my apologies if my sarcasm was not immediately apparent.

[Bushmiller]

Paul
I have a slightly different interpretation of most of what you say.

With the influx of renewables onto the Australian electricity market, the price of renewable (solar and wind) electricity has fallen to near zero -- during the main sunlight hours -- which in turn is making coal based electricity generation uneconomic. Your power station has to burn coal at near full capacity for around 10 hours per day, and loses a boat load of money while doing so, and then in the morning and afternoon peaks, those gas burning "bastards" -- aka peaking generators -- jump in and run their gas turbines for a couple of hours per month stealing what little profit you might otherwise make.

So coal is rapidly exiting the market place -- what you expect in a privatised competitive market -- and being replaced by gas fired stations.

But there's a war between Ukraine and Russia -- oops my mistake, Russian has a "special military operation" underway in Ukraine.

The "war" has driven up the oil price -- it's now north of USD $100 a barrel.
The spot market for gas is based on the spot market for oil -- but gas is priced in Giga Joules (energy delivered), while oil is priced in terms of volume (barrels).
It is the spot gas market that is important as no gas powered electricity generator is going to enter into a long term gas supply contract -- aka take or pay -- if they only need the gas supplied for a couple of hours per month. So the gas required will be purchased on the spot market.
The current spot gas price is about 2.5 times what it was 12 months ago. (USD $2.996 vs USD $7.244)


So straight off there is part of your answer.

The war in Ukraine has driven oil prices northwards and they have dragged the spot gas price with them.

ian

I have to say nothing is completely simple.

You are correct with your statement that electricity prices have fallen dramatically during the "sunny" hours and indeed at times they go to zero dollars or even a negative price,, but it is not consistent and neither do power stations have to generate at their maximum load all the time. Most stations can ramp down to a minimum amount of generation during periods of low pricing and develop strategies to combat these low prices. The last ditch effort is to wear the below economic price as that is still cheaper than coming offline and having the added cost of a restart. Certainly in time the price will be so poor that stations will have to close but we are not there yet and until satisfactory means of storing electricity are developed the coal stations will be there for a long time yet.

The stations that are about to close, such as Liddell, are old, at the end of their useful life, too expensive to repair and would have been due to close anyway.

Although daytime prices are low, for the moment, the night time market is buoyant as the 2022 Q1 is showing.

I have not worked at a gas powered station, but my impression is that they do have contracts, although I can't say for how long they are. My reason for saying this is during the SA power crisis a couple of years back, there was huge criticism levelled at the Pelican Point gas turbine station, probably unfairly I might add. At the time of the excursion one unit had been mothballed and that was the first impediment to starting up in a hurry. The second impediment for a longer term startup was that they "had no contract" to supply gas to that unit. This leads me to believe that they did indeed have a contract for the other unit and gas was not purchased on a spot market. In fact if they were buying on the spot market I don't see how they could bid. Bidding now is done on a five minute time frame! You absolutely need to know your ongoing costs and fuel is big.

Gas turbines are in the normal course of events are only used during peaks, which are during the "sunless" hours and generally system demand can be covered by the coal fired units. There is a slightly unusual situation at the moment with a number of units offline for maintenance and of course the Callide unit 4 is, and will be, offline for quite some time yet so that is placing pressure on the market. It is a graphic demonstration of what might happen if coal fired units were retired prematurely.

I should probably mention that there are two levels of gas turbine plant: Those that have an HRSG tacked onto the exhaust utilising low pressure steam and those that don't, which are consequently once though and quite inefficient.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Nothing is completely insurmountable, but some things are just too difficult or too uneconomic.

Many power stations have been making their own hydrogen, which is used for the cooling medium in the generators, for years. It is done by electrolysis and of course power stations have a cheap source of power to hand. The hydrogen is compressed and stored in large torpedo tubes at about 16mPa. At Millmerran we don't make our own hydrogen and buy it from a commercial supplier. So it is delivered by truck. I don't see the problem here. On our plant the pipework from the storage torpedoes to the individual units is stainless steel.

About half the hydrogen produced in the world is produced by a dirty process (steam reforming either natural gas or methane) and not electrolysis. That is not good for the environment. Hydrogen has to be made by electrolysis and the power source needs to be renewables.

Hydrogen needs development to make it easily available, but a few years ago so did EVs. While they are not yet ubiquitous we are in reach.

Regards
Paul

[ian]

You are correct with your statement that electricity prices have fallen dramatically during the "sunny" hours and indeed at times they go to zero dollars or even a negative price,, but it is not consistent and neither do power stations have to generate at their maximum load all the time. Most stations can ramp down to a minimum amount of generation during periods of low pricing and develop strategies to combat these low prices. The last ditch effort is to wear the below economic price as that is still cheaper than coming offline and having the added cost of a restart. Certainly in time the price will be so poor that stations will have to close but we are not there yet and until satisfactory means of storing electricity are developed the coal stations will be there for a long time yet.

The stations that are about to close, such as Liddell, are old, at the end of their useful life, too expensive to repair and would have been due to close anyway.

Although daytime prices are low, for the moment, the night time market is buoyant as the 2022 Q1 is showing.Paul
I wasn't meaning to imply that coal power stations were on their way out.

all coal fired stations will have a minimum fuel quantity that has to be burned to keep the steam temperature and pressure high enough so that the power station can come back online almost instantaneously -- the spinning reserve (?) -- or at a predicable future time as solar power output declines.
.
.



I have not worked at a gas powered station, but my impression is that they do have contracts, although I can't say for how long they are. My reason for saying this is during the SA power crisis a couple of years back, there was huge criticism levelled at the Pelican Point gas turbine station, probably unfairly I might add. At the time of the excursion one unit had been mothballed and that was the first impediment to starting up in a hurry. The second impediment for a longer term startup was that they "had no contract" to supply gas to that unit. This leads me to believe that they did indeed have a contract for the other unit and gas was not purchased on a spot market. In fact if they were buying on the spot market I don't see how they could bid. Bidding now is done on a five minute time frame! You absolutely need to know your ongoing costs and fuel is big.I would have said that for a gas fired plant, fuel costs are huge -- something like >95% of the operating cost.

But your other point is about Pelican Point having "no gas supply contract".
Gas supply contracts take several forms -- the supply infrastructure and the gas (energy) itself.
Pelican Point couldn't suddenly purchase the vast quantity of gas required unless the gas supply line to the plant is already pressurised.
So to me "no gas supply contract" strongly implies that, with one (out of two (?) units) mothballed, the Pelican Point owner had determined that the cost of keeping the plant's gas supply line fully pressurised between March and December 2016 was too costly at a time when it was expected that the plant may only need to be available to run for the few peak load hours over January and February 2017. The gas supply line wouldn't be drained, but the pumps that kept the supply line pressurised would be turned off. Remember that keeping the supply line pressurised costs Pelican Point money.

Also, at the time of the excursion -- late September 2016 -- the management expectation at Pelican Point would have been that the gas turbine wouldn't need to be available to supply electricity till late December that year, if at all over that summer. So "no gas supply contract" could mean what it says -- there was no contract in place in September because it was anticipated that the plant would not need to be available for switching on (gas supply line pressurised and gas supply contract (based either on the future spot market or a take-or-pay basis) for at least 3 months.

[ian]

Many power stations have been making their own hydrogen, which is used for the cooling medium in the generators, for years. It is done by electrolysis and of course power stations have a cheap source of power to hand. The hydrogen is compressed and stored in large torpedo tubes at about 16mPa. At Millmerran we don't make our own hydrogen and buy it from a commercial supplier. So it is delivered by truck. I don't see the problem here. On our plant the pipework from the storage torpedoes to the individual units is stainless steel.
Paul
I don't pretend to be a metallurgist, but on the basis that the Millmerran hydrogen pipework is all stainless steel, the idea (in Alberta) that the existing non-stainless steel natural gas network can be used to distribute compressed hydrogen across the country is ludicrous.

[FenceFurniture]

Toyota must have done research into hydrogen embrittlement. They are releasing a Prius and a Corolla in 2023 and both are H powered. The components of the engine and onboard storage that are steel (and exposed to H) would reveal the answer.

[Bushmiller]

something else I wanted to comment on ...

If the Australian electricity market is to convert to a mix of renewables and storage, rechargeable batteries won't cut it.
To guarantee the lights stay on -- something I suggest is a must -- Australia needs to be able to store grid scale power for around 72 hours.

At a rough estimate Australia currently uses 200 terawatt hours per annum. Allowing for the increase in usage driven by population growth and the increase in usage required to fully decarbonise the economy by 2050 -- I've seen estimates suggesting a three fold increase in electricity demand -- the demand for storage comes to about 5000 gigawatt hours. A Giga is 10^9, most power generators are rated in Megawatts 10^6, or the "number of homes" they can power.


Paul,
If I recall correctly, the power station you work at is rated at 500 MW.
So, if I have the proportions right your station would need to run flat out for 10^4 hours -- say 14 months -- just to charge the storage battery.

Ian

I missed this post before.

I have previously stated that for the Aussie grid to become fully renewable, the daytime capability needs to be closer to four times the current demand: That is is to store energy, be that batteries, pumped hydro, hydrogen production or any other form of energy storage that may be developed. Add cloudy days (could be up to a week) and the required capacity has probably risen to five times the current generation. Add the electrification of all the transport that is currently powered by other fuels and you may be talking six or seven times current demand. Actually with other forms of fuel throttled back presumably the industrial refining processes would be diminished so some electricity would be offset. However, I think the principle is clear: Down the track we will require much more electricity than is currently the case.

I am not clear on your comments regarding charging batteries from fossil fuelled stations as that would be counterproductive.

Millmerran has 2 x 435MW units. Power stations consume about 5% of their rated output to run their own auxiliaries (fans, pumps etc). So in our case we can send around 825MW "over the fence" into the grid. That of course is under ideal conditions. There are many factors that may limit the output, but normally our aim is to generate as much power as possible while ever the economic viability is there.

Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

Add cloudy days (could be up to a week)AHEM! Spoken like a true Queenslander! Can I just point out that down here, due to La Niña, between ~November and March there were probably 10 sunny days, and around maybe 15 days without rain. All the rest of the time it was persisting down wi' rain and the cloud cover was pretty dense. Electricity generation via Solar would have been considerably down I should think. Apparently this is the way of the future – smoke clouds or rain clouds.

Sometimes it stopped raining at night.

[Bushmiller]

Paul
I don't pretend to be a metallurgist, but on the basis that the Millmerran hydrogen pipework is all stainless steel, the idea (in Alberta) that the existing non-stainless steel natural gas network can be used to distribute compressed hydrogen across the country is ludicrous.

Ian

Neither am I a metallurgist. At the very least I would have to research the issue. Most articles refer to hydrogen embrittlement caused during the manufacturing process of the steel resulting in material failure down the track as opposed to a reaction with hydrogen being "piped" through the lines.

The torpedoes we use to store hydrogen, and are the transportation vessels (eight to a semi trailer), don't appear to be stainless, but I would have to check that when I am next at work. I am now in the transition phase to retirement and job share with a colleague so I am not back at work until 11 May.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

AHEM! Spoken like a true Queenslander! Can I just point out that down here, due to La Niña, between ~November and March there were probably 10 sunny days, and around maybe 15 days without rain. All the rest of the time it was persisting down wi' rain and the cloud cover was pretty dense. Electricity generation via Solar would have been considerably down I should think. Apparently this is the way of the future – smoke clouds or rain clouds.

Sometimes it stopped raining at night.

:D:D

Brett

I nearly made a reference to the "Sunshine State" not being typical. However, you have identified a solar flaw!

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

Toyota must have done research into hydrogen embrittlement. They are releasing a Prius and a Corolla in 2023 and both are H powered. The components of the engine and onboard storage that are steel (and exposed to H) would reveal the answer.
There have been several Hydrogen powered vehicles released to the market and the notable manufacturers are BMW, Honda & Toyota. The latter have provided several vehicles to the Federal for use in the ACT and Honda have pulled their latest attempt from the market in the US in recent times. It is a bit like VHS & Beta, someone is going to lose and my money is on Hydrogen not being practical for transport purposes at this point in time. For static industrial use where distribution is not so much of an issue I feel the jury is still out and my crystal ball is all scratched so I can't see into the future.

[Chris Parks]

I am now in the transition phase to retirement and job share with a colleague so I am not back at work until 11 May.

Regards
Paul

Practising for retirement is really hard work but someone has to do it.:U

[FenceFurniture]

my crystal ball is all scratchedAll of my balls are scratched too. Regularly.


I was going to say earlier that you probably have some kind of handle on how cloudy the last 5-6 months have been (although you fared a little better with cloud coverage than up here). What do your stats say about solar electricity generation?

[Bushmiller]

Practising for retirement is really hard work but someone has to do it.:U

:)

Chris

I and my job sharer colleague are the first people in the operations section to go down this path, which has previously only been the domain of the admin dept (and only female). As such it is a trial, but another two from operations are due to commence the same work practice in July: So far so good. As far as hard work is concerned I plead the 5th, although I have to say the projects assigned to me at home seem to have escalated.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I was going to say earlier that you probably have some kind of handle on how cloudy the last 5-6 months have been (although you fared a little better with cloud coverage than up here). What do your stats say about solar electricity generation?

Brett

Solar (commercially) typically is sited in the most sunny regions just as wind is sited in the windy spots. I imagine there are very few solar farms up on your mountain. I imagine that, apart form rooftop solar, there are few solar farms in the Blue Mountains. The problem then arises to transmit the electricity from one region to another.

This leads me to pose another question and that is how the existing thermal stations themselves will transition from their traditional method of producing electricity? They have all the infrastructure (power lines and transformers) existing. Will they gradually go solar or wind? The recent Cannon Brookes bid for AGL looked very much as though it was to acquire the infrastructure as much as the stations themselves. Trouble is that the thermal stations in recent years were positioned close to their fuel supplies and not for their suitability for wind or solar energy.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Also, at the time of the excursion -- late September 2016 -- the management expectation at Pelican Point would have been that the gas turbine wouldn't need to be available to supply electricity till late December that year, if at all over that summer. So "no gas supply contract" could mean what it says -- there was no contract in place in September because it was anticipated that the plant would not need to be available for switching on (gas supply line pressurised and gas supply contract (based either on the future spot market or a take-or-pay basis) for at least 3 months.

ian

Our information in the industry was that Pelican Point had been running their two units consistently at half load. For that reason they had deemed it more efficient to run a single unit at or near full load. Consequently the other unit was mothballed and effectively unavailable.

I don't know the breakdown of costs but usually, fuel is the largest single component.

Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

Solar (commercially) typically is sited in the most sunny regions just as wind is sited in the windy spots. I imagine there are very few solar farms up on your mountain. I imagine that, apart form rooftop solar, there are few solar farms in the Blue Mountains.I was thinking only of how it affects rooftop solar. I don't see that is not being part of the mix.

Just for one thing, and as ugly a thought as it might be, having all your energy generation across millions of sites (homes) grossly mitigates the chances of knocking out a country's electrical energy supplies in the event of war. I think our current Defence Minister would agree that it would be good preparation for the future.

[ian]

I am not clear on your comments regarding charging batteries from fossil fuelled stations as that would be counterproductive.
Paul

I wasn't sufficiently clear in my previous post.
I didn't mean to imply that electricity storage (grid scale batteries, pumped hydro, and similar) should be energised by fossil fuelled stations.


I meant to imply that using Li-ion technology, or other batteries, for storing electricity won't cut it when it comes to grid scale systems.
At seven times current electricity usage, the storage requirement becomes about 10,000 gigawatt hours.


There's over 20 million registered motor vehicles in Australia.
Assuming all these vehicles are converted to electric power -- a big ask for any vehicle that regularly needs to travel more than about 200 km per day -- the available battery materials will be fully utilised just powering motor vehicles, with very little battery material left over for energy storage.



Me thinks it maybe time for three or four transcontinental (Perth to Eastern state) DC interconnectors.
To supply solar power from WA to the Eastern states which, in solar terms, have their evening peak periods offset by 2 hours.
So WA can be feeding "clean" power to NSW, Victoria and Qld during the evening while the "sand gropers" are still at work.