Future of the Australian Electricity Market

[FenceFurniture]

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.IIRC this was discussed in t'other thread a year or so back, and was dismissed as as way too costly, and with that sort of money ($5 Bills per connector??) we could achieve better results with other tech, or investing in other tech research.

[Bushmiller]

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.

Ian

Yes, I misunderstood your previous reference. I have to say I don't know where energy storage is going to come from and I agree that batteries are going to be severely stretched: There will have to be something else for energy storage.

A DC link from WA to the East Coast is going to suffer huge transmission losses over nearly 3500Km not to mention the cost of the link and booster substations. Although talk of DC Links between Darwin and Indonesia , have been bandied around, all they have been is "bandied" around and I can't see much traction there at this time. Having said that, if the DC line was there is would provide the facility to feed into that line from desert based solar, or other, power sources along the way.

Hmmm.... food for thought.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Some really good thoughts above. Its excellent there are several insiders to provide insight.


My thoughts on Hydrogen are:

-- One doesn't need to transport it
-- It is made/generated in a place, then stored in that same place

At the source of energy:
-- Solar/wind farms obviously carry their loads during the peaks, yes?
-- So, if those renewable farms generate too much power, or the price is inequitable, they use the excess/cheap energy to generate hydrogen and store it on site
-- When the wind don't blow, nor the sun don't shine, or its night, or the electricity wholesale rate blows up, they use the stored H in their Magic Machines to pump out electrons.
-- Maybe this can also be used as an onsite delivery-leveller for variable weather days?

IF those solar/winds have grids connected up, which they would, as its WHY they are there, and so do the cities/places that use it.... why not generate the H within the city and store it there too?

At the source of the users:
-- The power already is already being delivered, yes?
-- Hindenburg, you say... but how is that worse than any other volatile substance we use now?
-- In fact, there will be no natural gas pipes, or petrol pipelines, or H-pipes or trucks.... the only infrastructure required will be electricity cables


Makes me think, is there an opportunity to use this like a Tesla Home Battery but a hydrogen store at home? No worse than a big BBQ bottle...

-- Suck in cheap electricity at night, generate H
-- use the H to power the home during the day


Everyone is hung up on the amount of power transmission is needed. Is this really the case though?

-- If the current system at its peak can handle a current PEAK volume, can it sustain that peak 24 hours a day? Or does it need to "rest" (IDK, cool down, or it buns out?)
-- So if we keep the whole system revving along at 80% all the time rather than 100% day 5% at 3am.....
-- Could this system then "transfer" H stored in one place, convert to electrons, pump via the wires, make H in "somewhere else"... (yeah, yeah, conversion efficiencies, etc, but lets ignore that)
-- all acting as some sort of self-levelling system?
-- e.g. if we know that Brisbane is going to need a lot of juice due to an oncoming heatwave, we pre-send a sheet-ton of electrons up there where its pre-stored a week or 3 before Brissy melts? (just like any natural gas, or fuel depot)


Its a bit like leaving the hose on overnight isn't it? By itself its pretty pathetic, but overnight it can certainly help fill a pool.

Will we ever get to a point where we will have too much H stored?


Obviously I'm just throwing around ideas and know little of the realities.

BTW, I think H cars are a bad idea. Electrification is the key.

[Beardy]

Mirai 2021 | Hydrogen Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle | Toyota AU (https://www.toyota.com.au/mirai)

[woodPixel]

Well, my ranting and raving are for naught - my ideas are hardly novel!

A quick DuckDuckGo shows there are PLENTY of H2 generators and H-to-e power units!

H2 Energy Offers Affordable Hydrogen Generator For Home Use - The Green Optimistic (https://www.greenoptimistic.com/h2-energy-hydrogen-generator/)


1kWh of electricity can be produced at a cost of 3 to 10 cents and 1kilogram of H2 (1 gallon of gas equivalent) costs about $1. A car can drive 60 miles on 1 kilogram of H2.


Edit - this is cool - these "petrol stations" make the Hydrogen onsite. There is even one in Canberra.... Australia 's third hydrogen-car refuelling station to open in Brisbane - Hydrogen Central (https://hydrogen-central.com/australia-hydrogen-car-refuelling-station-brisbane/)

[Chris Parks]

BTW, I think H cars are a bad idea. Electrification is the key.

Tell BMW, Toyota and Honda they are wrong. It is amazing that ALL the Japanese manufacturers have ignored the changes being forced on the automotive industry by legislation world wide perhaps because the Japanese Government seem to have ignored it also. There is some speculation that Mazda may not survive the changes because they seem to have completely ignored the move to BEV's except for one half hearted attempt which seems to be a total failure. It is all a bit strange as Toyota and Honda led the world with their hybrid models years ago.

[woodPixel]

I took a good look at hydrogen cars today.

There is not much more to them than a regular electric car.

There is a storage tank, a Hydrogen membrane to convert it to electrons, then to shove energy into the battery. Otherwise it's all fairly standard electric.

Which is interesting, for if one could charge the thing like a regular electric car, the Hydro addition is nothing more than a Just-in-case or a distance elongator.

So, as a novelty it's interesting, but a good charging infrastructure makes it a bit redundant. Useful for long trips though! (Ahem, Australia!)

Which sort of adds to the question of whether one could rip that hydro out after a prang and reverse it into other purposes... Eg a. Generator for a farm, etc....

[havabeer69]

re hydrogen transport and storage: hydrogen its self doesn't burn, its that pesky oxygen that screws everything up.

keep the purity 99.9% and everything is fine, that and use beryllium tools when working near the stuff (non sparking)

[Bushmiller]

Hydrogen tends to generate fear into the imagination of the populace in general and I think in no small degree the Hindenburg tragedy is primarily responsible for this. Historical images of the giant airship catching fire are burnt ( :rolleyes: ) into the fleshy tablets of our minds.

However, in the power industry we have used hydrogen for at least the last fifty years as the cooling medium for the rotors in our generators. As haveabeer has pointed out, it needs oxygen (from air) to be a combustible gas. There is an UEL (upper explosive limit) and a LEL (lower explosive limit). The LEL is about 4% of H2 in air, while the UEL is 75% of H2 in air. In the power stations we are very careful to make sure these limits are adhered to. The only time our hydrogen could be outside these ranges is when we are either purging or refilling the generator. In fact even then we do not allow this to happen as purging of hydrogen is done with CO2 first before introducing air or when refilling the air is first purged with CO2 before introducing hydrogen.

I don't think hydrogen will be burnt in cars: It will be the fuel cell technology, which is significantly different and potentially much safer....I think. Some information here:

Fuel Cell Basics | Department of Energy (https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/fuel-cell-basics)

For the sensationalist seekers among you some more information on the explosive nature of H2:

Hydrogen Explosion - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics (https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/hydrogen-explosion#:~:text=The%20flammability%20%EE%80%80limits%EE%80%81%20of%20%EE%80%80hydrogen%EE%80%81%20in%20air%20are,5.14.%20%EE%80%80Hydrogen%20explosion%EE%80%81%20experiments%20in%20containers%20of%20)

Regards
Paul

PS: The beryllium tools mentioned by haveabeer are very sexy looking (pretty much look like brass, but are a little harder), not as robust as steel and very expensive.

[FenceFurniture]

PS: The beryllium tools mentioned by haveabeer are very sexy looking (pretty much look like brass, but are a little harder), not as robust as steel and very expensive.The drivers (speakers) in my headphones are beryllium – so thin that it floats down like a feather (demo in a video)

[Chris Parks]

And the Poms are starting to distribute load on the grid via electric car charging at off peak times


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMagvdqlF9c&t=402s&ab_channel=eFIXX

[FenceFurniture]

WRT H fuel cell EVs, do we know if you can also charge them at home (or wherever) with the cheapest electricity of all, or do they have to constantly make their own elec?

[Glider]

Little wonder this thread has been so resilient, and lots of interesting information shared. A couple of comments about hydrogen if I may. "Green Hydrogen" has been reported as only 35% efficient when used for combustion and 41% using fuel cells. Saul Griffiths argues that direct conversion from wind or solar and stored in batteries is the best use of the source energy. His point is pretty compelling.

Why is anyone even thinking about H2 powered cars? Liquid hydrogen has a specific gravity of 0.07. Add a storage cylinder which is safe to say 20,000 psi and insulated to cryogenic levels, and that's what you'd be carting around in your car. Am I missing something here?

mick

[FenceFurniture]

Saul Griffiths argues that direct conversion from wind or solar and stored in batteries is the best use of the source energy. His point is pretty compelling. Why is anyone even thinking about H2 powered cars?G'day Mick,

Agreed, but many people will need an option for Outback Oz, and elsewhere in the world, where there will never be any charging stations, but either a desire or a need to travel there. Sticking a solar panel on the roof *may take some time*.


Liquid hydrogen has a specific gravity of 0.07. Add a storage cylinder which is safe to say 20,000 psi and insulated to cryogenic levels, and that's what you'd be carting around in your car. Am I missing something here?I presume you're referring to accident impact. Maybe the stats on LPG explosions in accidents might yield a clue to this. I know it's a different can of worms to H2, but if either of them explode I think you'd be just as dead.

[GraemeCook]

Well, my ranting and raving are for naught - my ideas are hardly novel!

A quick DuckDuckGo shows there are PLENTY of H2 generators and H-to-e power units!

H2 Energy Offers Affordable Hydrogen Generator For Home Use - The Green Optimistic (https://www.greenoptimistic.com/h2-energy-hydrogen-generator/) ...


That is a real waffle article, WP, strong on hype but devoid of any credible facts. The first sentence sums it up:
" ... Low-cost hydrogen generator from H2 Energy Renaissance is coming soon to wipe out fossil fuels. ... "
That little phrase "is coming soon" is code for "It does not exist yet".

Tell me when it arrives at Bunnings!

[Chris Parks]

A video from someone who has a few qualifications in the engineering field on Hydrogen in cars


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ajq46qHp0c&ab_channel=EngineeringExplained

[Bushmiller]

That's a good link Chris. Visitors to this thread might also like to see his other video on the relative pros and cons of H2 vs Gasoline (petrol to us). It may be that only turbocharged or supercharged engines are suitable as always the problem is getting air into the engine's cylinders. It's all about air rather than the fuel. Best option for H2 appears to be the the fuel cell.

The Difference Between Gasoline And Hydrogen Engines - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6ECwRnJ0Sg)

Also an entertaining Dinky Die "exposé" as to why H2 is no good for the combustion engine.

Everything wrong with hydrogen fuel for internal combustion engines | Auto Expert John Cadogan - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu1v7d7-Wh0)

His fact #3 is pertinent in particular (Go Green). Also much of his detail replicates our American mate.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

Jason always presents his facts and education videos well and in clear language, Cardogen I will leave to others who are attracted to his somewhat manic style and to my eyes bias. Thanks for the heads up on the second video Paul, I had not seen one. What I have been looking for is a video explaining how the Hydrogen fuel cell works in detail and why it would be any better than a BEV at this point in time. JCB in the UK are pushing Hydrogen for farm equipment and if it could be produced on the farm via renewable energy it could be a winner as farming is a huge contributor to green house gas emissions. hydrogen farm equipment - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=hydrogen+farm+equipment) The top two videos are to be recommended.

[Bushmiller]

Something that I don't think has been addressed is that in ten to twenty years (my conjecture on timelines and pure guesswork) there will be a whole heap of fossil fuelled cars trucks and agricultural/industrial equipment. I am supposing that they will in fact be phased out to some extent due to natural attrition. Does this mean that at some point owners of private vehicles and commercial operators will have to completely replace their fossil fuelled combustion vehicles with EVs? Or will they be able to convert their old vehicles to H2 fuel (combustion not fuel cell)? For the owners who replace their vehicle on a regular basis, this won't be a problem, particularly as the cost of EVs reduces with the combination of technology and sheer volumes, but for those that have older vehicles or only buy second hand, what will be their options?

Twenty to thirty years ago there was a big push to run vehicles on LPG and conversions were available for that purpose so perhaps something similar for H2. There are also all those car enthusiasts out there with classic, vintage, veteran and other collectible forms of transport. What are they going to do?

One other quick question. As EVs begin to dominate what will take the place of oil excise? I think one state has already made moves to start taxing EVs on a different basis.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

Victoria have already got the tax thing covered ZLEV road-user charge : VicRoads (https://www.vicroads.vic.gov.au/registration/registration-fees/zlev-road-user-charge) as at least one US state

and the US Special Fees on Plug-In Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (ncsl.org) (https://www.ncsl.org/research/energy/new-fees-on-hybrid-and-electric-vehicles.aspx)

The turnover in the European and US fleets will be quicker because the road conditions destroy cars due to salted roads whereas Australia by world standards has a pretty old fleet because we don't have that problem. The Europeans are regulating disposal to a very high degree, here is BMW's operation and it is fascinating to see the detail of how they dispose of old cars.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzKdevYQpgA&ab_channel=AmazingRoadLife

[FenceFurniture]

Something that I don't think has been addressed is that in ten to twenty years (my conjecture on timelines and pure guesswork) there will be a whole heap of fossil fuelled cars trucks and agricultural/industrial equipment. I am supposing that they will in fact be phased out to some extent due to natural attrition. Does this mean that at some point owners of private vehicles and commercial operators will have to completely replace their fossil fuelled combustion vehicles with EVs? Or will they be able to convert their old vehicles to H2 fuel (combustion not fuel cell)? For the owners who replace their vehicle on a regular basis, this won't be a problem, particularly as the cost of EVs reduces with the combination of technology and sheer volumes, but for those that have older vehicles or only buy second hand, what will be their options?

From last week:

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.

[Chris Parks]

It is inevitable is that during the run down of ICE vehicles no matter what fuel is used there will come a time when they can't be repaired either because the knowledge is not there on the part of the service personnel or simply because the industry refuses to work on them. Even now it is becoming obvious that the first generation of cars with a lot of electronics can't be easily fixed because the knowledge has left the industry or the diagnostic equipment is not available. The repair industry as we know it will be destroyed because the small workshop won't be able to work on the new cars being manufactured and the amount of work or servicing required simply disappears. Jay Leno who has a very popular YouTube channel recently said that his seven year old Tesla has not been serviced apart from expendable items such as tyres for the whole time he has owned it and that includes the brake pads which have never required replacement either. The ownership of a BEV reduces costs hugely which is a big plus but it costs a lot of money to buy one.

[FenceFurniture]

Jay Leno ..... and that includes the brake pads which have never required replacement either.When you own 160 vehicles (or something) you can only drive each one so far!

As ICE vehicles are phased out the fuel will become considerably more expensive too, I would imagine, as they make less and less each year.

[Bushmiller]

https://www.woodworkforums.com/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by Bushmiller https://www.woodworkforums.com/images/buttons/viewpost-right.png (https://www.woodworkforums.com/f43/future-australian-electricity-market-240514-post2279039#post2279039)
Something that I don't think has been addressed is that in ten to twenty years (my conjecture on timelines and pure guesswork) there will be a whole heap of fossil fuelled cars trucks and agricultural/industrial equipment. I am supposing that they will in fact be phased out to some extent due to natural attrition. Does this mean that at some point owners of private vehicles and commercial operators will have to completely replace their fossil fuelled combustion vehicles with EVs? Or will they be able to convert their old vehicles to H2 fuel (combustion not fuel cell)? For the owners who replace their vehicle on a regular basis, this won't be a problem, particularly as the cost of EVs reduces with the combination of technology and sheer volumes, but for those that have older vehicles or only buy second hand, what will be their options?

From last week:

https://www.woodworkforums.com/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by FenceFurniture https://www.woodworkforums.com/images/buttons/viewpost-right.png (https://www.woodworkforums.com/f43/future-australian-electricity-market-240514-post2278498#post2278498)
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.






Regards, FenceFurniture

Brett

It appears we are on the same page even though I had missed your page (not sure how I did that)!

:-

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

... 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. ...

Few areas are as weight conscious as aviation, and Airbus have been experimenting with battery powered aircraft - imagine the engineering expertise that they can access:
Electric flight | Airbus (https://www.airbus.com/en/innovation/zero-emission/electric-flight)

They observe that one kilogram of avgas contains the energy equivalent of 15-20 kgs of batteries at the current state of the art.

That weight of batteries effectively curtails electric planes at present. Airbus has adopted a monitoring role, waiting for the next development in battery technology.

One of the interesting developments from their research is that aircraft are apparently extremely inefficient on the ground when taxiing. On their electric aircraft they just added an electric motor to the front wheel; this resulted in significant fuel savings. This development is now being evaluated for application in large aircraft.

[Chris Parks]

When you own 160 vehicles (or something) you can only drive each one so far!

As ICE vehicles are phased out the fuel will become considerably more expensive too, I would imagine, as they make less and less each year.

The Tesla is his daily drive and he travels a lot but I get your point.

[Bushmiller]

Graeme

It's good to see a company looking to the future and it seems they have been doing that for at least 12 years. A few other companies, and governments, could take inspiration from that.

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

... For the owners who replace their vehicle on a regular basis, this won't be a problem, particularly as the cost of EVs reduces with the combination of technology and sheer volumes, but for those that have older vehicles or only buy second hand, what will be their options? ...

As an economist, I have been trying to consider an even broader question. What will be the impact of electrical vehicles on the second hand market? The answer is: "I haven't a clue."

With ICE cars many businesses and individuals change their cars on a predetermined schedule - 2 years or 40,000 kilometres is a common metric, other 5 years and so on, some on accumulated repair/maintenance costs, others on a whim. What about electrics?

Most current electric cars have a warrantee of 7 to 10 years on the battery. Then what? How many batteries last much more than 10 years? What is the replacement cost of a full set of batteries for an electric car? I have tried to find out and have failed - its a secret - there is massive debate on the web on this point. But is it relevant? the cost of Li-ion batteries has dropped 80% in the last 10 years - what will the price be in 10 years time? Will it be higher or lower than the value of a 10 year old vehicle? Will the life span of a vehicle be one set of batteries? Or will one replace technologically redundant batteries with future technology?

"I haven't a clue."

[FenceFurniture]

No, I've no clue either Graeme. I suspect that on one hand they won't depreciate as much as ICE cars due to no gearbox, simpler engine, less parts in general to wear out, but on the other hand, in the first ten years of "serious" takeup of EVs, there will be so many new developments that they will probably depreciate faster than ICE cars. Although I suppose those new developments will be largely in batteries rather than drivetrain. One hopes that a used up set of batteries will be easily interchanged with whatever the new tech of the time is. I can see battery tech improvements going on for many decades yet.

[woodPixel]

I think cars are going to go the same way as planes - there will be a transition.

Think about Sydney cars during peak hour, creeping along all burning fuel. Its madness. A combo-car with a battery and an electric motor will allow all that noise and pollution to be gone. The electric bits can putter around, the petrol for the big trips (or when the juice runs out).

I drove today and was behind an hybrid/electric Toyota corolla (?), it pulled an impressive clip. I've a 6L HSV that thumps out 255kw at the wheels and that Corolla accelerated like the wind. Nice!

There are many new shops converting big old dino-juice guzzlers like mine to electric (https://www.evalliance.net.au/). Its turning into a big thing. Rip out the engine, drivetrain and the car is half the weight. The battery packs and motors bolt in, plus some wiring tomfoolery. I personally think this will be HUGE. Old cars, which have more style, will become highly sought after.... here is an example: Revolt Systems (https://revoltsystems.com/)

This BEAST puts out 450kw and 800 NM of torque. .... Far. Out.!

511172
It won't take long for businesses to realise the potential of after-market change overs.

I was looking online for a car for the son... learning to drive and hates the Nissan Pulsar I acquired for him (its a tidy car, but has no PIZZAZ!).... now I saw a very decent BMW and an excellent Mercedes, both elegant, but lots of Km's, but only $6-7k. Now, if one were to rip out all the guts and put in electrics, you'd have a nice modern looking car with modern safety plus refreshed guts. Nice! :)

As a bit of dystopian thought - insurance companies could also enforce "learner limits" or "P Plate limits" on power output easily enough too. Just flick a switch. Creeps my skin thinking like this, but I can guarantee they are!

[woodPixel]

Most current electric cars have a warrantee of 7 to 10 years on the battery. Then what? How many batteries last much more than 10 years? What is the replacement cost of a full set of batteries for an electric car? I have tried to find out and have failed - its a secret - there is massive debate on the web on this point. But is it relevant? the cost of Li-ion batteries has dropped 80% in the last 10 years - what will the price be in 10 years time? Will it be higher or lower than the value of a 10 year old vehicle? Will the life span of a vehicle be one set of batteries? Or will one replace technologically redundant batteries with future technology?

"I haven't a clue."

Ah! I know!

A friend of mine bought an original Toyota PRIUS second hand. It was a classic "little old lady car" that didn't have a scratch.... $1500

FAR OUT!

Problem was the battery was dead as a doornail and throwing up a thousand warning lights. A real Xmas tree! She was quoted a fortune to "fix it".

Bugger that! Told him to buy it. We ordered a battery re-pack from the USA ($1300, plus a swap-fee that is refundable) and it took me only the day to swap it out... it wasn't trivial, but compared to a regular engine swap its a diddly, with no grease! There must have been 30,000 bolts..... it is ABSOLUTELY something a thinking person can do (NOT a "consumer")

Swapped it out, flipped the Mega Switch of Death and just like Frankensteins Monster... its aaaallllivvvveee!

The pack had to be ordered in as there wasn't an AU supplier. That will change.


Of a note, I also checked the brake pads and rotors. They still looked new. Crazy!

[Chris Parks]

Batteries are an unknown at this point in time but there is an aha! point about car batteries generally not known and that is the manufacturers are reserving part of the battery from every day use and as the used part starts to degrade they release a bit more of the reserved part to keep up the efficiency and range. As for hybrids they won't happen in large numbers because who wants to have the complication of ICE with all its potential problems and add another layer on top of it. They will fade out quickly as the Zero Emission date has to be allowed for in the design cycle which is around 3 to 5 years and that date is generally 2030. Approaching that date all the old ICE vehicles will not be replaced so the change over period will start in earnest well before 2030. Of course none of this applies to Australia you say but if ICE cars aren't made then we have to buy what is made but we aren't stuck to a hard date just yet. It will be interesting to see what happens if we have a change of Government at the upcoming elections as the Labour side of politics has shown more interest in electric cars and that could change things. Strangely it does not seem to be a big agenda item this time round compared to last time.

[Chris Parks]

Ah! I know!

A friend of mine bought an original Toyota PRIUS second hand. It was a classic "little old lady car" that didn't have a scratch.... $1500

FAR OUT!

Problem was the battery was dead as a doornail and throwing up a thousand warning lights. A real Xmas tree! She was quoted a fortune to "fix it".

Bugger that! Told him to buy it. We ordered a battery re-pack from the USA ($1300, plus a swap-fee that is refundable) and it took me only the day to swap it out... it wasn't trivial, but compared to a regular engine swap its a diddly, with no grease! There must have been 30,000 bolts..... it is ABSOLUTELY something a thinking person can do (NOT a "consumer")

Swapped it out, flipped the Mega Switch of Death and just like Frankensteins Monster... its aaaallllivvvveee!

The pack had to be ordered in as there wasn't an AU supplier. That will change.


Of a note, I also checked the brake pads and rotors. They still looked new. Crazy!

So buy Prius with stuffed battery, fix Prius and flip it = profit!

[woodPixel]

So buy Prius with stuffed battery, fix Prius and flip it = profit!

I suspect there will be a fair bit of this.

I did it after having watched a few youtubes and finding a service manual on b-ok.org .... so it wasn't just an attack-with-spanners thing. I was weary of the potential for mayhem, but had to admit, there was very little to it. All the electrics are shielded and the thing doesn't go live until two massive throw-levers are pushed down.

There was a disconcerting amount of plastic however. But it was all ABS, so there's recycling in mind.

One thing I did note was there is a fan to the side of it. Just like ones fridge. Its a PITA to get to and Id imagine that $5 fan must be the cause of many lights, overheats, premature dead batteries and slow charges. I saw it as an obvious design fault. At minimum there should have been a basic filter for it. Oh well, Im sure they fixed that in later models! :)

[FenceFurniture]

Meanwhile, the urgency increases.

511211

[GraemeCook]

I was suspicious of FF's graph as it looks too regular to be true, so I went back to the source.
Global Monitoring Laboratory - Carbon Cycle Greenhouse Gases (https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/)

It checks out. Thanks FF.

[Bushmiller]

Brett

That graph on CO2 concentration is "slightly" disturbing. That comment is of course tongue in cheek. The concentrations in fact have risen slightly in the last couple of decades while not being completely exponential. It is disturbing because this is the period that the world at large has begun to recognise climate change as a reality, has begun to take measures to check CO2 and continues to tolerate denialists. I guess the detractors would say, "See, it hasn't made any difference," but I believe the reality is that we have to do more, do it quickly (as far as putting strategies in place, because there is no quick fix) and stop poking fun at small island nations that potentially will go under water.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Topical because we have been talking H2 and storage, but don't get overly excited because it is only at the discussion level.

WA to look at hydrogen power target (msn.com) (https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/wa-to-look-at-hydrogen-power-target/ar-AAWXD20?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=4a7930f9ed5b40abb054a133cba57131)

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

another solution for long term storage is available: Rechargeable Molten Salt Battery Freezes Energy in Place for Long-Term Storage - Scientific American (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rechargeable-molten-salt-battery-freezes-energy-in-place-for-long-term-storage/)

and here is the in-depth non-pap paper: A freeze-thaw molten salt battery for seasonal storage (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666386422000911?via%3Dihub#)


If there's trouble reading the links due to paywalls, use this plugin, it bypasses petty much everything: magnolia1234 / Bypass Paywalls Chrome Clean * GitLab (https://gitlab.com/magnolia1234/bypass-paywalls-chrome-clean)




Sprenkle envisions something like tractor-trailer truck containers with massive batteries inside, parked next to wind farms or solar arrays. The batteries would be charged on-site, allowed to cool and driven to facilities called substations, where the energy could be distributed through power lines as needed.

[Bushmiller]

I thought this was an interesting synopsis of the current state of play for the EV market.

The final barrier stopping Australians from embracing EVs is information (thenewdaily.com.au) (https://thenewdaily.com.au/life/auto/2022/05/05/electric-cars-evs-australia-information/?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Sunday%20Best%20-%2020220508)

In brief, it outlines the take up of EVs in Oz compared to the rest of the world, the number of vehicles sold as a percentage of total sales, the typical ranges on a charge, the incentives offered by individual states and number of models available amongst other information.

Interestingly Tesla sold about 80% of the EVs. That points to EVs being more affordable at the up market end of the spectrum.

One aspect troubled me and that is the tendency, primarily, for owners to charge their vehicles at night. This really nullifies the benefit of EVs as solar generation is out of the equation and wind may be minimal. Some incentive should be made to charge during the day on an "off-peak" type of arrangement similar to water heaters and pool pumps. However, the "off-peak" period now has to be moved to daytime, if it has not already been implemented.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

EV's all tend to be at the top end of the market because there is more margin in the car for the manufacturer to help recoup costs. The OEM's are being forced into making the change to electric via legislation which is hugely punitive and would send the average company broke in short order if they don't meet the emission/sales targets set for the major European markets. What is going to be supplied to the rest of the world is yet to be made clear and that is possibly where the Japanese see an opportunity because there is a lot of this world that cannot support the cars that will be made for the European market after 2030.

[ajw]

Just got an email from my provider telling me that my usage charges are going up 27% in two week’s time. Why does that say about the future of the market? My daughter got a similar email from her provider - up 22%. They have reduced the daily access charge by 10 cents…. Very generous. How will people manage such major price hikes? Are other forum members seeing this from their providers?

cheers,

ajw

-

[ian]

EV's [at least currently manufactured ones] all tend to be at the top end of the market because there is more margin in the car for the manufacturer to help recoup costs. The OEM's are being forced into making the change to electric via legislation which is hugely punitive and would send the average company broke in short order if they don't meet the emission/sales targets set for the major European markets. What is going to be supplied to the rest of the world is yet to be made clear and that is possibly where the Japanese see an opportunity because there is a lot of this world that cannot support the cars that will be made for the European market after 2030.I'm not so sure about this conclusion.

Many ICE cars only travel to and from childcare, school, the shops or train station each day. (The average Australian car travels less than 40km per day, corresponding to a journey radius of less than 20 km.)
However, after considering that the "average" Sydney household generates around 8 trips per day -- Sydney is the city I am most familiar with -- if one pair of trips is associated with one person travelling to and from work, the other 6 trips are associated with the other household member making an average journey with a radius of about 5 km.

These sorts of short journeys really only require that a vehicle be able to carry the daily/weekly shopping and/or a few passengers, that the vehicle occupants be protected from the weather (heat, cold, rain), and arrive at their destination neither sweating nor out of breath.

Given that e-bikes and electric scooters are only beginning to penetrate the market, how likely is it that these sorts of small battery electric vehicles will, in time, come to dominate -- at least in terms of numbers -- the Australian market by 2030?

Of course, after heavy goods vehicles (greater than 20 tonnes), medium goods vehicles (10 to 20 tonnes), light commercial vehicles (4.5 to 10 tonnes), there will always be a place for the larger, greater range electric cars (and SUVs), but I don't think that the typical low mileage electric vehicle needs the sort of daily range that is not currently available with a pedal assisted E-bike (e-bikes are currently exempt from registration fees, are road tax exempt, and can use bike lanes!) or e-scooter.

I'm currently thinking that the "typical" daily commuter vehicle might evolve into a form of short range e-scooter -- with the larger longer range BEV reserved for weekend journeys and other longer trips.

The down side of this transport "transition" will be that there will be many fewer plug-in battery pack EVs (standard model 3 Tesla's come with a 50kWh battery) to provide load balancing to the grid after the sun stops shining. This is the exact opposite of what is currently being assumed by the electricity grid managers.

[BobL]

We live in South Perth (on the opposite side of the Swan river to the CBD) and walk the dogs on the South Perth foreshore anytime between 6 and 10 am. Over the last couple of months as Covid restrictions have been lifted were seeing more cars free-parked in the streets and people walking into the city, or using bikes, e-bikes or e-scooters - it's only ~5km to the middle of the CBD via the narrows or Causeway bridges . I stopped to talk to a 20 something e-scooter commuter getting his scooter out of huis car - he said he lives 30km from the CBD and where he parks on the foreshore is only about 3km from his office. He said he can bring his scooter into his office (whereas he's not permitted to bring a bike/e-bike in) and he can charge the battery at the office. Interesting arrangement, OK his 3km e-scooter commute won't last too long - South Perth council are increasingly installing ticketed or timed parking right across the foreshore but all he has to do is park a bit further out.

[FenceFurniture]

Apparently they have only been legal in Perth since December 2021 (or maybe <10kph was ok before then). You can still only ride them on private property in NSW regardless of their power or speed, but I guess that will change.

[Bushmiller]

Apparently they have only been legal in Perth since December 2021 (or maybe <10kph was ok before then). You can still only ride them on private property in NSW regardless of their power or speed, but I guess that will change.

E-Scooters are ubiquitous in Brisbane including models just parked up ready for hire in the street. In the parks there is an issue, to my mind, with scooters and pedestrians sharing the same footpaths. As a pedestrian you need to most watchful before changing direction!

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

I should clarify what I wrote, by saying that BEV's are at the top end of the market I mean that the initial push will be in that sector and as the 2030 date approaches we will see a large move by the OEM's into the lower priced end where the margins are much thinner. The automotive industry is going to cop a huge cold bath as its after sales serving and repairs income is severely reduced but they have not woken up to that in Oz.

[Chris Parks]

I'm currently thinking that the "typical" daily commuter vehicle might evolve into a form of short range e-scooter -- with the larger longer range BEV reserved for weekend journeys and other longer trips.


It will take a huge change of mind to convince the car buyer of that. Mazda have released a limited range vehicle as you have described and they can't give them away because everyone sees the range and says no thanks. With Sydney expanding this is becoming a problem for those living on the outer fringes such as myself. A Mazda would be marginal for me to travel to my old place of work and it is so highly priced I could buy a Tesla 3 and hardly notice the difference. Mind you the Mazda is built many times better than the Tesla and having been in both of them I much prefer the Mazda. Elon's QC is abysmal and he does not care because he can sell every vehicle Tesla make. Mazda in the US are trying to get around the short range issue by offering a free ICE car to every buyer for longer trips for limited times a year.

[woodPixel]

Mazda in the US are trying to get around the short range issue by offering a free ICE car to every buyer for longer trips for limited times a year.

This is INCREDIBLY smart.

When I was in Sydney I was bopped from behind coming down onto the Spit bridge from Warringa (the left corner with that hideous blind street). Car was in the shop for a bit.

The insurance company (QBE!) gave me a stipend to use for a rental. Being a Holden driver (tall and chonkii!) SWMBO rang them and asked what they could do. They gave me a brand new car off the lot for something like $43 a day.

I was amazed.

Soon after, we travelled to Tassie. Same deal. Holden we more than happy to rent us a car. So we flew down. It was a hell of a lot cheaper than the rental companies. They did say there should be an upper limit on kms though, but it wasn't unreasonable, more than enough for a travelling holiday for a couple of weeks. I don't recall the cost, but it must have been cheaper than taking our own down.

The arrangement struck me as blindingly obvious.

It was clearly the future of car "ownership".

[woodPixel]

We live in South Perth (on the opposite side of the Swan river to the CBD) and walk the dogs on the South Perth foreshore anytime between 6 and 10 am. Over the last couple of months as Covid restrictions have been lifted were seeing more cars free-parked in the streets and people walking into the city, or using bikes, e-bikes or e-scooters - it's only ~5km to the middle of the CBD via the narrows or Causeway bridges . I stopped to talk to a 20 something e-scooter commuter getting his scooter out of huis car - he said he lives 30km from the CBD and where he parks on the foreshore is only about 3km from his office. He said he can bring his scooter into his office (whereas he's not permitted to bring a bike/e-bike in) and he can charge the battery at the office. Interesting arrangement, OK his 3km e-scooter commute won't last too long - South Perth council are increasingly installing ticketed or timed parking right across the foreshore but all he has to do is park a bit further out.

VERY smart.

This is apparently a thing here in Canberra too.

Parking here is a bit contentious. People see it as a country town and the idea of paying for parking is an obscenity.

Canberrans, being sometimes irrationally tight, will park in the 'burbs and do exactly this... the use eScooters. They are everywhere.

There is even a plan where the scooters are leased (via a boop-creditcard) and left all over the place (there is a bit of bruhaha about the mess).... but the idea is that people who wish to get from one side of the city centre to the other just grab a scooter and off they go. Apparently the system works very well.

The region where I live (a new town centre) has a HUGE uptake of electric bikes, scooters, eTrail-bikes and some weird mono-wheel like skateboards. All the school kids fly past each morning screeching in delight. They certainly go a hell of a lot faster than 10km! I'd recon some are 40 to 60... no doubt they've been souped up somewhat.....

[woodPixel]

hehe. Look at this thing....

1000 watt motors, 35km distance and 50km/h... kogan.com (https://www.kogan.com/au/buy/black-off-road-turbo-electric-scooter-stealth-1-6/)

It would be excellent fun.

Battery minibikes, scooters and motorcycle like things are certainly part of the future.

511434

[GraemeCook]

Just got an email from my provider telling me that my usage charges are going up 27% in two week’s time. Why does that say about the future of the market? ... -

It tells me that your retailer is increasing the prices because he thinks that you will pay it; there is no alternative.

Interestingly, the Australian Energy Regulator collects and collates the wholesale price of electricity in the eastern states grid. For the quarter ended 31 March 2022 with prices quoted in $’s per megawatt hour:


· In NSW the contract price varied between $76 and $95.25 averaging $84.43, which is substantially lower than the average price in the same quarter in 2019 ($107.59),
· Queensland contract prices were substantially higher than NSW,
· Victoria and South Australia contract prices were significantly lower than NSW,
· Tasmanian contract prices are not released publically as there is only one significant producer,
· The average spot price for NSW was $89 which was essentially the same as in 2017,
· Only Queensland was higher at an incredible $171,


Daily Q1 base contract prices and traded volumes - New South Wales | Australian Energy Regulator (https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistics/daily-q1-base-contract-prices-and-traded-volumes-new-south-wales)
https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistics/quarterly-volume-weighted-average-spot-prices-regions (https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistics/quarterly-volume-weighted-average-spot-prices-regions)

[GraemeCook]

... The region where I live (a new town centre) has a HUGE uptake of electric bikes, scooters, eTrail-bikes and some weird mono-wheel like skateboards. All the school kids fly past each morning screeching in delight. They certainly go a hell of a lot faster than 10km! I'd recon some are 40 to 60... no doubt they've been souped up somewhat.....

Same here, e-scooters everywhere and they seem a lot of fun.

Only serious bitch that I have heard is from a neighbour who uses both manual and motorised wheelchairs:

"how do you move an abandoned scooter out of the way, from the seat of a whheelchair?"
"With 15 years wheelchair experience, I am legally limitted to 8 kmh everywhere, but inexperienced scooterists can do 50."
The default speed limit in Tasmania is 50 kmh unless therwise posted,
We live in a heritage suburb with a posted speed limit of 40 kmh,
But that limit is not posted on footpaths, so the default speed limit there is 50 kmh.
cyclists appear to exceed that limit!

[Bushmiller]

Graeme's general post (#552) and links prompted me to comment that the QLD market at the moment is ballistic as far as the spot price is concerned. The following shot is of the overall market on the East coast and shows how little solar is in play (presumably because of cloud cover):

511443

Bear in mind the above is just a snapshot.

I think the second quarter of 2022 will show very different spot prices, which certainly appear to have increased significantly. I don't think I am being mischievous when I say it is because storage has not kept up with solar installation and thermal power has decreased slightly because of unavailability. Autumn is traditionally a period of low demand and consequently low prices. That is not at all what we are seeing.

This is a price snapshot (I think Tassie was $253 at the same period, but did not fit on my snapshot)

511444

Bear in mind that earlier in the day prices were a lot higher. The QLD price converted to KW/hr would be 31c: This is the wholesale price and probably more than most people are paying at the retail level.



Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

hehe. Look at this thing....

1000 watt motors, 35km distance and 50km/h... kogan.com (https://www.kogan.com/au/buy/black-off-road-turbo-electric-scooter-stealth-1-6/)

It would be excellent fun.

511434You're right, it would be excellent fun, and I covet one (never had a scooter as a kid :no:). However, the max load is 100kg, so that prolly rules out anyone tall and chonki, and rules me out if I buy more than about 5-6kg of food. Although I suppose I could go naked and save another 2 kg), but think of the gravel rash...

[Bushmiller]

Although I suppose I could go naked and save another 2 kg), but think of the gravel rash...

and the old ladies having a heart attack....or a stroke :wink:

Regards
Paul

[FenceFurniture]

and the old ladies having a heart attack....or a stroke :wink:

Regards
PaulI can't see why a scooter would scare them?

[BobL]

This morning as part of the dogs walk we walked for about 1km alongside the main southern freeway immediately south of the Narrows bridge. I haven't walked this path at commuter time for 4-5 years, anyway I counted 22 pedal bikes, 3 e-bikes and 7 e-scooters heading north into the city, and 3 pedal bikes heading south.

[havabeer69]

Just got an email from my provider telling me that my usage charges are going up 27% in two week’s time. Why does that say about the future of the market? My daughter got a similar email from her provider - up 22%. They have reduced the daily access charge by 10 cents…. Very generous. How will people manage such major price hikes? Are other forum members seeing this from their providers?

cheers,

ajw

-

NSW prices have been hovering between $200 and $300 on the spot price for the last few weeks. the retailers aren't going to pay those prices them selfs.

time to vote in/out the policy makers

[GraemeCook]

NSW prices have been hovering between $200 and $300 on the spot price for the last few weeks. the retailers aren't going to pay those prices them selfs. ...

Not quite as dire as the spot market indicates. Base load power (c.80%) is bought on contracts which are far less volatile. Here's a source of spot prices:
AEMO | NEM data dashboard (https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem)
As you can see, the spot price in NSW today fluctuated between $250.84 and $503.59 per mwh.

For Tasmania, today's spot price fluctuated between $225.42 and $995.94 per mwh. It can be very volatile!


... time to vote in/out the policy makers ...

The Ukrainians voted for a commedian and elected a leader. Will we vote for some politicians .... and elect a bunch of commedians?

[GraemeCook]

While looking at the spot prices above, I stumbled on this calculation of the sources of power for the elctricity generated in each state. Note - these figures are for a single day - today. Source is: AEMO | NEM data dashboard (https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem)

511536

I was surprised by the diversity of figures.

Only Tasmania was totally green,
NSW generated 81% from fossil fuels,
Queensland generated 92% from fossil fuels,
South Australia generated 83% from gas, and
No state produced statistically significant solar electricity, today; the sun didn't shine!


AGAIN, emhasise figures are for one day only.

[ian]

Graeme,
I can't find a copy of the data you displayed.
However, I can find the data for the 24 hour ending at 4 AM on May 11.

Are you sure that the data you presented represents the full 24 hours through to midnight on May 12, and not a fuel snap snap shot as say 11 PM on May 12?
In particular I find it very difficult to believe that for all of SA, TAS, VIC, NSW, QLD the sun didn't shine at all during the whole day.

following is the satellite cloud image for 11:30 AM, AEST on May 12
http://www.bom.gov.au/gms/IDE00135.202205120030.jpg

[woodPixel]

511543

[GraemeCook]

Graeme,
I can't find a copy of the data you displayed.
However, I can find the data for the 24 hour ending at 4 AM on May 11.

Are you sure that the data you presented represents the full 24 hours through to midnight on May 12, and not a fuel snap snap shot as say 11 PM on May 12?

I gave the source in the above post, Ian; here it is again: AEMO | NEM data dashboard (https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem)

When you get to that "dashboard" just hit the Price & Demand button. I just re-tested it and got immediate access.

It gives a rolling graph showing showing demand and price in 5-minute segments over the previous 24 hours and projections over the next 24 hours.

My post covered the period up to about 10pm, and I just ignore the initial two hours data before midnight yesterday.



... In particular I find it very difficult to believe that for all of SA, TAS, VIC, NSW, QLD the sun didn't shine at all during the whole day. ...

But it doesn't report that the sun did not shine all day. It says that less than 0.5% of the electricity fed into the state grids was solar generated. (0.49999% gets rounded down to zero.)

[Bushmiller]

Over the last few days Solar generation has been low. Yesterday in QLD was one of the greyest days I have seen in a long time. So there was very little solar generation. The spot market price does distort the overall average price as much is under contract. However I can't find out how much of our own generation is under contract so perhaps (Graeme) you could link to where you are getting that information, which I guess is overall thus not giving away confidential information.

The spot price is sufficiently import that traders at each power station seek to maximise their return.

Just on generation in Tasmania, There is a DC connector under Bass Strait to the mainland. Most people assume it was installed so Tassie could send power to the mainland. Actually the primary reason was the other way around. Tassie's power is all in one basket: Hydro. If they have a drought, they are in trouble. In fact they had been exporting power to Victoria, arguably because they saw a way to make some extra money, when the DC link broke a few years back. They had depleted their dams and had to rely on diesel generators, which had to be shipped.

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

Hi Paul

You are right in that the details are shrouded in "commercial-in-confidence" but I vaguely remember the figure of 80% being mentuioned in a "usually reliable source" - otherwise I would have dismissed it. Also it is in the right ball park from any sort of monte carlo or pareto simulation. That's why I qualified it as c.80%.

Bass-link cable was sold to the public as a combination of drought-proofing (as you mention) and as an arbitrage opportunity.

Coal fired powerstations take time to fire up and down, so they cannot react quickly to changes in demand. Hydro can be switched on and off almost instantly. Power is sold to the mainland grid in those hours when prices are high and then bought back when prices are low. Power flows both ways virtually every day, and often does not flow.

[Bushmiller]

Hi Paul

You are right in that the details are shrouded in "commercial-in-confidence" but I vaguely remember the figure of 80% being mentuioned in a "usually reliable source" - otherwise I would have dismissed it. Also it is in the right ball park from any sort of monte carlo or pareto simulation. That's why I qualified it as c.80%.



Contracts are a double edged sword from the generator's viewpoint. On the positive side you are getting a guaranteed price, which is often required by the financial institutions. The down side is that you are obligated to meet those contracts under all circumstances. If you cannot provide that generation you have to buy it back from the market and assuming that one of your units was no longer able to provide, the market price has very likely escalated. Consequently it is unwise to contract too much if you have a limited number of units: I should qualify that by saying the government stations that have multiple units, not all in the same location necessarily, are much better placed to absorb an unscheduled outage.

For example, Gladstone has six units and could probably contract 80%, but a station with only two units would be foolhardy to contract 80% of their available generation for the reason I have outlined above and their contracts would be closer to 50%. Millmerran has two units but I and indeed anybody on the operations side has no knowledge of how much of our power is under contact as this is confidential and a closely guarded secret. Consequently I would be surprised if the overall contract are up at 80%, but I could believe that some stations are around there. The four unit stations would likely be in the region of 75%.

Regards
Paul

[NeilS]

The Ukrainians voted for a comedian and elected a leader. Will we vote for some politicians .... and elect a bunch of comedians?


... : ~}

[GraemeCook]

Contracts are a double edged sword from the generator's viewpoint. ...

Ditto, from the retailers perspective - contracts say take or pay. Therefore, compromise.

[ian]

I gave the source in the above post, Ian; here it is again:
https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem

When you get to that "dashboard" just hit the Price & Demand button. I just re-tested it and got immediate access.

It gives a rolling graph showing showing demand and price in 5-minute segments over the previous 24 hours and projections over the next 24 hours.

My post covered the period up to about 10pm, and I just ignore the initial two hours data before midnight yesterday.

But it doesn't report that the sun did not shine all day. It says that less than 0.5% of the electricity fed into the state grids was solar generated. (0.49999% gets rounded down to zero.)
Graeme
I copied and pasted your link to NEM's dashboard (thank you for providing the link) and then clicked on the Fuel Mix tab.

What I'm trying to convey is that your data seems to represent a snap shot as at 10 PM AEST on May 12, not the fuel mix over the whole of May 12.

Below is screen shot for SA of the 48 hour period up to 4 AM AEST on May 13. The 48 hour period covers both May 11 and May 12.
The yellow shading represents the periods during which the sun was shining and providing solar power to the SA grid.
(In the main, roof top solar is not included in NEM data as the roof top systems are too small a scale to be registered in the market.)

[Bushmiller]

Ian

Looking at your screenshot I noticed something that is slightly misleading. SA shows no generation from coal. Now while it is true in that SA no longer has coal fired generators of it's own, there are two interconnectors from Victoria capable of more than 500MW. I assume these are incorporated into the Victorian output, but it does make SA "look" a little greener than it really is as extensive use is made of that line.

Regards
Paul

[ian]

Paul
As of right now (11:25 AM May 14 AEST) the SA-VIC interconnector is exporting 104 MW to Victoria. The second interconnector is either idle or shut for maintenance.
Victoria in turn is exporting a net 504 MW to NSW -- the actual values are 948 export, 388 import
Victoria is also exporting 247 MW to Tasmania via BassLink.


As far as I can tell, the fuel mix only applies on a state basis.
This, in part, allows the ACT to beat their chest about how green their electricity is.

So while ACT might actually get all their electricity from black coal generation, they can pretend that their contracted solar farms -- the Royalla Solar Farm (opened in 2014 has a long term fixed price supply contract of $186 / MWh -- are providing 100% renewable energy.


As others have noted elsewhere, the Australian Government has dropped the ball big time when it comes to a policy environment.

[Bushmiller]

Paul
As of right now (11:25 AM May 14 AEST) the SA-VIC interconnector is exporting 104 MW to Victoria. The second interconnector is either idle or shut for maintenance.
Victoria in turn is exporting a net 504 MW to NSW -- the actual values are 948 export, 388 import
Victoria is also exporting 247 MW to Tasmania via BassLink.


As far as I can tell, the fuel mix only applies on a state basis.
This, in part, allows the ACT to beat their chest about how green their electricity is.

So while ACT might actually get all their electricity from black coal generation, they can pretend that their contracted solar farms -- the Royalla Solar Farm (opened in 2014 has a long term fixed price supply contract of $186 / MWh -- are providing 100% renewable energy.


As others have noted elsewhere, the Australian Government has dropped the ball big time when it comes to a policy environment.

Ian

The power always (actually, make that nearly always as there are from time to time other considerations) flows from the lowest price to the highest priced state and can cascade through two or three states with this effect up to the transmission limits. The SA mix will be very different in the sunless hours tonight, but still, as you point out in the ACT, there will be no coal burnt for power in SA, apparently.

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

Graeme
I copied and pasted your link to NEM's dashboard (thank you for providing the link) and then clicked on the Fuel Mix tab.

What I'm trying to convey is that your data seems to represent a snap shot as at 10 PM AEST on May 12, not the fuel mix over the whole of May 12. ...

Not so; that is quite wrong.

I had the site set to supply data for the 24 hours up to 10pm on the 12 May.


... Below is screen shot for SA of the 48 hour period up to 4 AM AEST on May 13. The 48 hour period covers both May 11 and May 12.

The yellow shading represents the periods during which the sun was shining and providing solar power to the SA grid.
(In the main, roof top solar is not included in NEM data as the roof top systems are too small a scale to be registered in the market.) ...

It is quite true that the yellow shading represents periods when the sun was shining and solar electricity was being fed into the grid.

However, the total solar power generated was less than 0.5% of the total electricity in the period and was rounded down to one. This is shown on the table below your graph - now highlighted with a red circle.

My understanding is that roof top solar is purely retail; only commercial solar enters the wholesale spot market. Correct me if I am wrong.

511668NEM date selected by Ian, highlighted by me.

[GraemeCook]

Possibly the best indication of sources of electricity is to look at the NEM aggregation for the year to 14/5/22.

511670 AEMO | NEM data dashboard (https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem)

This covers most of the wholesale electricity market centres excluding Western Australia. Highlights for the last year are:

75% of electricity was from fossil fuels,
25% was from renewables - hydro, wind and solar,
roof top solar is not included.

[ian]

Not so; that is quite wrong.

I had the site set to supply data for the 24 hours up to 10pm on the 12 May.

It is quite true that the yellow shading represents periods when the sun was shining and solar electricity was being fed into the grid.

However, the total solar power generated was less than 0.5% of the total electricity in the period and was rounded down to one. This is shown on the table below your graph - now highlighted with a red circle.

My understanding is that roof top solar is purely retail; only commercial solar enters the wholesale spot market. Correct me if I am wrong.

511668NEM date selected by Ian, highlighted by me.
Graeme
As I understand the chart, the Solar values you have highlighted represent the state of play between 3 and 4 AM on 13 May.
If you move the slider on the area chart to other times over the 48 hour period -- you have to be in the actual data chart (reference the link you provided) not the screen shot I posted -- you will see that solar's contribution varied depending on how the sun was shining.

The average Solar value over the 48 hour period (to 4 AM May 13) is said to have been 6%, refer to the bar chart above the area chart.

[Bushmiller]

My understanding is that roof top solar is purely retail; only commercial solar enters the wholesale spot market. Correct me if I am wrong.



That is my understanding too.

Regards
Paul

[russ57]

I have mentioned before that I am on a 'wholesale' rate (amber).
Currently prices are substantially higher than they have been, way above the vic default offer. The supplier has price insurance so it is rebated back to that vdo, but in the meantime the prices are "disturbing"...
I also notice the forecasts (next 12 hours) are very unreliable.
My goal has been to loadshift to reduce overall cost, fairly successfully until the last couple of months, but it's a struggle at the moment.
(what is reliable is the ausnet TOU putting up prices between 3 and 9 ��)

[ian]

Previously in this thread, I've mentioned the issue of Hydrogen embrittlement of carbon steels.
And if I recall correctly, Bushmiller mentioned that the hydrogen used (to cool the turbines ?) at his coal fired power station is delivered in thick steel cylinders and distributed through the station in stainless steel piping. I'm not sure if Paul mentioned if the power station stores the hydrogen in stainless steel tanks, or if the hydrogen is delivered direct to where it is required.

This article, from my local chip outer wrapper -- Rocky Mountain Outlook -- gives an indication of what the different colours of hydrogen are and puffs the virtue of combining carbon capture and storage with steam reforming of natural gas -- which is mostly methane Alberta is banking on hydrogen to lead its green transition - RMOToday.com (https://www.rmotoday.com/beyond-local/alberta-is-banking-on-hydrogen-to-lead-its-green-transition-5366705?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Email)

Given the embrittlement issue I remain to be convinced that hydrogen can be safely transported in a pipeline designed for the transport of natural gas.
As far as I know, hydrogen embrittlement is mostly investigated in the context of very small amounts water and welding. I know of no studies looking at the risks of transporting hydrogen through carbon steel piping. Paul has mentioned in passing that the piping used at Millerrann is all stainless steel.

and as for carbon capture and storage, if the technology is so mature that it is commercially being used in Alberta why is the Australian Government still investigating the issue?
Perhaps, because CCS it's just a con?

[Bushmiller]

Previously in this thread, I've mentioned the issue of Hydrogen embrittlement of carbon steels.
And if I recall correctly, Bushmiller mentioned that the hydrogen used (to cool the turbines ?) at his coal fired power station is delivered in thick steel cylinders and distributed through the station in stainless steel piping. I'm not sure if Paul mentioned if the power station stores the hydrogen in stainless steel tanks, or if the hydrogen is delivered direct to where it is required.

This article, from my local chip outer wrapper -- Rocky Mountain Outlook -- gives an indication of what the different colours of hydrogen are and puffs the virtue of combining carbon capture and storage with steam reforming of natural gas -- which is mostly methane Alberta is banking on hydrogen to lead its green transition - RMOToday.com (https://www.rmotoday.com/beyond-local/alberta-is-banking-on-hydrogen-to-lead-its-green-transition-5366705?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Email)

Given the embrittlement issue I remain to be convinced that hydrogen can be safely transported in a pipeline designed for the transport of natural gas.
As far as I know, hydrogen embrittlement is mostly investigated in the context of very small amounts water and welding. I know of no studies looking at the risks of transporting hydrogen through carbon steel piping. Paul has mentioned in passing that the piping used at Millerrann is all stainless steel.

and as for carbon capture and storage, if the technology is so mature that it is commercially being used in Alberta why is the Australian Government still investigating the issue?
Perhaps, because CCS it's just a con?

Ian

I have to stress that I am in no way a metallurgist and can only report on my observations at my work sites and perhaps link any reading I have turned up. I have worked at four power stations and three of those used hydrogen for cooling. The cooling is for the rotor of the generators (the stator is cooled by demineralised water piped through the hollow copper conductors. Water is a poor conductor of electricity: It is the impurities that conduct so once they are removed removed it is safe). Early generators, such as the first station I was at, used air to cool the rotors, but that gas has more windage (sixteen times more) and poorer heat transfer than Hydrogen. At Bayswater we made our own hydrogen, compressed it and stored it in large "torpedo" tubes. At Millmerran we buy in our hydrogen and mainly it arrives in similar large torpedos on a semi trailer. Each torpedo is the length of the semi. We also have smaller, vertical, emergency packs.

The vessels are not stainless and as you have mentioned the hydrogen embrittlement issue seems to be mainly during welding processes and there is little information on the gas being piped. The hydrogen trailer is left at Millmerran so that becomes our storage vessel and we hook it up to out distribution manifold, which is all stainless steel including the pipework to the units. However, I would not necessarily read too much into that.

This is a basic appraisal of the embrittlement issues:

Hydrogen - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen)

As far as transportation is concerned, this was interesting:

Hydrogen Transport - Features - The Chemical Engineer (https://www.thechemicalengineer.com/features/hydrogen-transport/)

The article also mentions smaller tanks in vehicles.

On CCS: This is, to put it euphemistically, controversial. The separation of the CO2 is complicated, involves steam and a complex plant. Then the CO2 has to be compressed. Then it has to be found a suitable storage location and transported to that site, pumped underground and capped off. Whew!!

Having said that, as I have mentioned before, we are supposedly putting in such a plant at Millmerran. However, it is a pilot plant to prove the technology is possible and I don't think that too much store should be placed in the viability of CCS for the moment. Any Australian politician spruiking about CCS should be taken with the proverbial grain of salt and dismissed as talking from the wrong orifice (just my opinion :) ). As for the government putting up their hands for research, there is, I believe, some sort of government support for our project, but if I was being cynical I would suggest it is a vote catcher or a nod to the coal companies. I am a little surprised that the coal companies themselves have not volunteered funding for research, but I am not aware of this happening. That in itself could be indicative of the viability.

I would like to think I am entirely wrong on all these statements and I guess time will tell: It is true to say that some locations will be better placed than others to support a CCS venture of this nature. I did look up your Alberta reference. It appears to be calling for interest and was established only in the Autumn of 2021 so it is very recent.

Carbon Sequestration Tenure Management | Alberta.ca (https://www.alberta.ca/carbon-sequestration-tenure-management.aspx)

Nothing in place for the moment, although on the positive side they are at least looking for alternatives. If 89% of your energy is still produced from fossil fuel even after all this time, I expect there is a big incentive to clutch at any straw no matter how tenuous.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

The UK are now in the process of converting homes to Hydrogen so they must have answers or one would hope so. converting homes to Hydrogen - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=converting+homes++to+Hydrogen)

[GraemeCook]

The UK are now in the process of converting homes to Hydrogen so they must have answers or one would hope so. converting homes to Hydrogen - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=converting+homes++to+Hydrogen)

Very skeptical of the rigour of anything on YouTube, but couldn't find that article. Just a miscellaneous pile of videos on hydrogen.

Liked this one, but how would his vehicle maintain traction in the BS?
Hydrogen Hybrid Conversion For ANY Vehicle - I&#39;m Saving 56% At The Gas Pump! - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5nld6HzEjM)

[woodPixel]

I'm disappointed with the lack of solar and wind generation in those charts above.

Obviously nobody is going to invest in a turbine if the price doesn't support it, but that may be because the price hasn't priced in the future.

I'm not a huge fan of China, but I do read a lot of their material on government projects and the sciences.

Without a doubt, they are absolutely hammering it on solar and wind. They seems to be putting up monster turbines at the rate of hundreds a day.


I'm very disappointed the government sees the generation of power to be purely a commercial objective. Yeah Yeah liberalism and private enterprice, hooray.... but it doesn't have any vision.

It hasn't priced in the future, nor planned for the future. It severely disappoints me that we look at everything on such a short term basis.


Imagine what we could do!

Solar farms everywhere.... one drives from Canberra to Sydney (or Melbourne) and its 300km of NOTHING and 1100km of NOTHING. The farms look sad and lonely.

If only we put a few solar farms down. Put in 20 times the volume we have. Put wind where we can...

It would drive that coal-usage number right down.


Its not a matter of political will, its a social and environmental necessity. Its beyond economics - its survival.


Check this picture. I sent it to the kids yesterday. India and Pakistan are WILTING under the extreme heat.

511715

[Bushmiller]

Very skeptical of the rigour of anything on YouTube, but couldn't find that article. Just a miscellaneous pile of videos on hydrogen.

Liked this one, but how would his vehicle maintain traction in the BS?
Hydrogen Hybrid Conversion For ANY Vehicle - I'm Saving 56% At The Gas Pump! - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5nld6HzEjM)

Graeme

After I saw Chis' links I found this one for a company called Rosen, which appears to be European based and German.

Hydrogen | ROSEN Group (rosen-group.com) (https://hydrogen.rosen-group.com/?gclid=Cj0KCQjwpv2TBhDoARIsALBnVnlJerewL_6OYHFtHd1ZNebZZ5utOE9LfkxwpLknK22bhXu1SgjgwfYaAjdzEALw_wcB)

It seems to be offering support to convert gas pipe lines into Hydrogen pipe lines. I was wondering how safely your gas oven could become a hydrogen oven? On thing I discovered during a brief research was that although pure H2 burns virtually invisibly, the presence of impurities will allow it to be visible. At the very least some degree of smell would need to be introduced, but that is already done with other substances so not insurmountable.

However, they don't say they have converted any yet. They may still be waiting for the hydrogen!

Regards
paul

[GraemeCook]

... and as for carbon capture and storage, if the technology is so mature that it is commercially being used in Alberta why is the Australian Government still investigating the issue?

Perhaps, because CCS it's just a con? ...


I suppose that you will say that "clean coal" was a myth, as well.

But when you try to think of the long term effects of pumping CO2 underground you get some "strange" questions:

Will it convert the aquafier to soda water?
How does the CO2 know its got to stay underground. With the thermal gradient, will it percolate back to the surface?
Will it react chemically with the many substances in the geology?
Finally, how will or can its efficacy be policed, and by whom?

And CO2 is a strange critter - consider this phase diagram:

511720

Remember:

ambient temperature increases quickly with depth,
sub-aquous pressure increases very quickly with depth - water table is aquous, and
dry air pressure increases slowly with depth.

[Bushmiller]

Solar farms everywhere.... one drives from Canberra to Sydney (or Melbourne) and its 300km of NOTHING and 1100km of NOTHING. The farms look sad and lonely.

If only we put a few solar farms down. Put in 20 times the volume we have. Put wind where we can...

It would drive that coal-usage number right down.



WP

Over the last few days additional solar farms would have made no difference at all. The cloud cover blanketing much of Eastern Australia just goes to show that we are no where close to going green with any degree of security. Until the government of the day wakes up and starts to develop storage facilities, whatever they may be, there is absolutely no point in dramatically increasing solar generation. If that were to happen, it would place greater financial pressure on the thermal stations and they would be forced out of business: Good we might say, but for three quarters of the day we would have no electricity to speak of. Over the last week we would have had no power for most of the day.

One aspect I have to emphasise is that you can't have nearly enough power. As soon as the frequency can no longer be maintained at 50Hz, and that margin is very narrow, AEMO have to load shed or risk the system collapsing. Have a look at the charts posted on this page, deduct the coal percentages (about 70%) and then we know how many of us would be without power.

I would love there to be more solar, but it must not happen before they sort out how they are going to store it. As you have said so many times, the government is dragging the chain and even if there is a change of government, I am not that hopeful there will be much difference.

I saw an interesting article by Alan Kohler, who I normally regard well, but I think he missed the point this time:

Alan Kohler: The next government must be honest about the end of coal (thenewdaily.com.au) (https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/finance-news/2022/05/12/coal-end-alan-kohler/?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Sunday%20Best%20-%2020220515)

He, too, think we don't have enough solar and adds that the coal plants are failing (an element of truth because they are ageing). However he missed the fact that more solar without storage will exacerbate the problem. I do agree with the headline that "We must be honest about coal."

Regards
Paul

[GraemeCook]

I'm disappointed with the lack of solar and wind generation in those charts above.

Obviously nobody is going to invest in a turbine if the price doesn't support it, but that may be because the price hasn't priced in the future. ...


Commercial wind and solar are included in the charts. Remember, it relates to the wholesale market for electricity. I think that this means the high voltage grid.

Roof top solar are excluded. Essentially they are reatil transactions.

Home generation of wind electricity is neglible and likely to stay that way. Noise polution is a major issue.

But you will like this. Over the past twelves months the wholesale sources of electricity for South Australia have been:

55% - Wind
6% - Solar
1% - Batteries
38% - Gas

(SOURCE: https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem)

[GraemeCook]

Graeme
As I understand the chart, the Solar values you have highlighted represent the state of play between 3 and 4 AM on 13 May. ...

OOPS! Thanks, I mis-read the chart.

[NeilS]

Probably not in my lifetime...

Australian researchers show solar power can be generated at night - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-17/australian-researchers-show-solar-power-can-be-generated-at-nigh/101070388)

The published techo details, if your so inclined...

Just a moment... (https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsphotonics.2c00223)

Given the very long timeline for the development of the solar cells that are now ubiquitous in solar panels, it could be a long time coming, if ever, and very unlikely to contribute to a 2050 target.

Timeline of solar cells - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_solar_cells)

[GraemeCook]

Probably not in my lifetime...

Australian researchers show solar power can be generated at night - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-17/australian-researchers-show-solar-power-can-be-generated-at-nigh/101070388)
...


Exciting, but it could be a long research road. So far they have achieved "proof of concept" only; they have an electricity conversion of 1/100,000th that achievable in daylight hours.

They seem to have done this by extending the solar capture into the infrared zone. This might also mean increased efficiency during daylight hours.

[woodPixel]

here is another tech that will be useful: High Hopes claims stratospheric breakthrough in direct air CO2 capture (https://newatlas.com/environment/high-hopes-carbon-capture-balloons/)

These things can remove a ton a day of CO2 at USD$50 a ton.

Nice! Good article too.

[ian]

here is another tech that will be useful: High Hopes claims stratospheric breakthrough in direct air CO2 capture (https://newatlas.com/environment/high-hopes-carbon-capture-balloons/)

These things can remove a ton a day of CO2 at USD$50 a ton.
Good to know

we'll only need around 200 MILLION of them (operating cost USD $15 Billion, pa) to "clean up" the CO2 emissions from 2021 alone.


me thinks, very much speculation at this stage.

[ian]

One aspect I have to emphasise is that you can't have nearly enough power. As soon as the frequency can no longer be maintained at 50Hz, and that margin is very narrow, AEMO have to load shed or risk the system collapsing. Have a look at the charts posted on this page, deduct the coal percentages (about 70%) and then we know how many of us would be without power.Paul,
Don't forget that natural gas is also a fossil fuel.

the number of us [in NSW] without any power would have been around 90% for at least some period over the past 48 hours. In round numbers that's 9 out of 10 households or 7.5 million people.

For Queensland it's worse, around 11 out of 12 households.
and in Victoria it would have been 19 out of 20 households.

The real truth is that if we, as a nation, are to attempt to meet net zero (CO2 emissions) by 2050 our policy makers have to tell us the real, unpalatable truth -- the transition will cost the nation more than a s**t load of money -- perhaps more than three times as much as was borrowed during Covid.


Not to mention the environmental costs (visual, low frequency noise, land clearing, bird strikes, etc.) of expanding wind generation by perhaps 300 times -- that's 30,000% more wind than is currently installed.
Currently, if wind turbines are not located close to existing transmission lines, the cost of installing the necessary infrastructure makes the project non-viable.

[ian]

Probably not in my lifetime...

Australian researchers show solar power can be generated at night - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-17/australian-researchers-show-solar-power-can-be-generated-at-nigh/101070388)

The published techo details, if your so inclined...

Just a moment... (https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsphotonics.2c00223)

Given the very long timeline for the development of the solar cells that are now ubiquitous in solar panels, it could be a long time coming, if ever, and very unlikely to contribute to a 2050 target.


Exciting, but it could be a long research road. So far they have achieved "proof of concept" only; they have an electricity conversion of 1/100,000th that achievable in daylight hours.

They seem to have done this by extending the solar capture into the infrared zone. This might also mean increased efficiency during daylight hours.
Funny this

The CBC's science show Quirks & Quarks -- equivalent to the ABC's Science Show -- did a segment on this only a week or so ago.

The key take-outs are that a team from MIT has developed an infra-red energy converter -- a sort of solar cell if you will -- that works in the infra-red area of the spectrum, converting heat directly to electricity.
If I have the numbers right, the IR cell's efficiency is about 40% -- about 2x that of a typical solar cell.

The solution appears to be scalable -- the researchers used graphite (carbon) blocks as their heat battery.

If I have managed to copy and paste the link ...

New heat-to-electricity device could make large thermal batteries a reality
Energy storage is viewed as a key technology to enable full deployment of renewable but intermittent energy sources like wind and solar. A team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology led by Dr. Asegun Henry (https://meche.mit.edu/people/faculty/[email protected]) has developed a new thermo-electric device that would allow efficient extraction of energy stored as heat. This could enable large-scale and cost-effective thermal battery systems to work with renewable power. The research is published in Nature (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04473-y).
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The link to the audio should be here https://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/may-7-endangered-tiny-porpoise-mars-quakes-thermal-batteries-and-more-1.6443011

[Bushmiller]

Paul,
Don't forget that natural gas is also a fossil fuel.

the number of us [in NSW] without any power would have been around 90% for at least some period over the past 48 hours. In round numbers that's 9 out of 10 households or 7.5 million people.

For Queensland it's worse, around 11 out of 12 households.
and in Victoria it would have been 19 out of 20 households.

The real truth is that if we, as a nation, are to attempt to meet net zero (CO2 emissions) by 2050 our policy makers have to tell us the real, unpalatable truth -- the transition will cost the nation more than a s**t load of money -- perhaps more than three times as much as was borrowed during Covid.


Not to mention the environmental costs (visual, low frequency noise, land clearing, bird strikes, etc.) of expanding wind generation by perhaps 300 times -- that's 30,000% more wind than is currently installed.
Currently, if wind turbines are not located close to existing transmission lines, the cost of installing the necessary infrastructure makes the project non-viable.

Ian

When I said "coal", I should have said "fossil fuel" as I added both types together to achieve 70%.

I have not done any calculations as to how expensive a transition might be, but certainly not cheap, and the even more of a problem is who is going to put their hand up to do the R & D?

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Energy storage is viewed as a key technology to enable full deployment of renewable but intermittent energy sources like wind and solar.



Ian

We need to hold that thought for a moment.

"Energy storage is viewed as a key technology to enable full deployment of renewable but intermittent energy sources like wind and solar."

I think the simple fact is that emission reductions are all but impossible without energy storage (with the exception of the nukes, but as there are so many associated issues with that technology, we may leave that alone for the moment). Until significant effort is thrown at storage we are just going to dance around in circles and the unconscionable "right" are going to keep paying it off.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

here is another tech that will be useful: High Hopes claims stratospheric breakthrough in direct air CO2 capture (https://newatlas.com/environment/high-hopes-carbon-capture-balloons/)

These things can remove a ton a day of CO2 at USD$50 a ton.

Nice! Good article too.

WP

I have quoted before in this thread one of the ways of ranking the CO2 emissions of any fuel used in power stations is a measure called the "carbon intensity." The gas stations are rated from a low of .6 to .8 while the coal fired plants are in the range of .8 to 1.3. In simple terms these figuresare the weight in tonnes for every MW produced each and every hour! Any station older than twenty five years is going to be greater than 1. Any station forty years old will bw towards the top end. The now defunct Hazelwood was a diabolical 1.6! The other brown coal stations are...I don't know, but think high.Again I have not done any calculations, but that is an awful lot these plants that would be required and the $50/tonne is only when scaled up. I also don't know if it included compression transportation and storage. However, I am being a little negative here because out of research something viable will develop.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Saline Water-Based Mineralization Pathway for Gigatonne-Scale CO2 Management (https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c08561)

Another one for the cynics here! Ill convert you grumpy curmudgeons yet! :)

This one reacts the huge quanta of CO2 in water (rather than the 400ppm in air) into various Interesting Minerals.

Water has 50x more CO2 in it than air. This method can process 10Gt per year of the whopping 37Gt we emit (!!!!)

An interesting read.

a thought - IF there were a price on CO2 emission these types of projects would be worth a fortune.

511885

[Bushmiller]

Another one for the cynics here! Ill convert you grumpy curmudgeons yet! :)



:D

Water covers something like 73% of the planet and perhaps insufficient attention is given to marine based solutions. A brief glance at the article highlights one aspect is the integrity of the storage, which is under pressure. That would require constant monitoring

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

a thought - IF there were a price on CO2 emission these types of projects would be worth a fortune.

511885

I believe that was the essence of the much maligned carbon tax as the incentive would have been there to develop solutions.

Regards
Paul