Future of the Australian Electricity Market

[Bushmiller]

I have started this thread as one to which general comments on the state of play in the electricity market can be added. This is partly because any time an associated electricity thread arises we almost inevitably gravitate towards electricity generation and in doing so tend to hijack the original thread. The latest example of this was in Glider's thread on electric vehicles (https://www.woodworkforums.com/f43/electric-hybrid-wait-240206).

Towards the end of that discussion a question was asked by Chris Parks on whether a media article was hype or reality:

Media hype??? Electricty market: Coal plants in peril as prices plunge (https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/closures-any-day-coal-plants-in-peril-as-prices-plunge-20210307-p578gx.html)

So perhaps I can start by giving my interpretation on that. The answer is both yes and no. The coal fired plants are already having to adapt to the increasing emergence of renewable power. Solar power has "stolen" the daytime demand. That in itself is a little fudged as there is some guarantee in place for the solar installations on prices and consequently it is not just market driven. The thermal plants can only reasonably make a sustainable income during what I have taken to calling the "sunless" times of the day. This implies that a station which relied on operating at high load for the majority of the day can no longer do so.

Back to the question, Are they in Peril? They are approaching this point but probably more slowly than the article implies. The oldest stations will be the first to be impacted severely, but all thermal stations are affected to some degree. Eventually of cours the stations will be in peril to the point where they will close as they are no longer viable. There is another issue in that the last seven coal fired stations were all built in Queensland. Theoretically, they are the newest and most efficient and would be the last to be shut down, but they are all in the same geographical location and while the Eastern Seaboard has a grid that is interconnected there are issues transporting power over these distances.

For the moment the thermal stations are required to control frequency (maintaining 50Hz) and solar power is unable to do this: Another reason why thermal stations cannot be immediately stopped.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

It would behoove Coal plants to think that their futures are secure.

Tech seems to be going nuts right now.... it probably wont last, but its certainly going for the fat underbelly of the coal-dinosaur.

This from today... and I wasn't even looking!



Cyprus, Greece and Israel on Monday signed an initial agreement to build the world's longest and deepest underwater power cable (https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN2B015M) that will traverse the Mediterranean seabed at a cost of about $900 million and link their electricity grids. The project, called the Euro-Asia interconnector, will provide a back-up power source in times of emergency, said Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, who was in Nicosia to sign a memorandum of understanding with his counterparts. Cypriot Energy Minister Natasa Pilides said it marked "a decisive step towards ending the island's energy isolation, and consequently, our dependence on heavy fuels."

The cable will have a capacity of 1,000-2,000 megawatts (MW) and is expected to be completed by 2024, according to Israel's energy ministry. With a length of about 1,500 km and a maximum depth of 2,700 meters, it will be the longest and deepest subsea electricity cable to have ever been constructed, it said. Calling the project a "2,000 mega-watt highway," Pilides said the first stage is expected to be operational within 2025. It will cover three sections of the Mediterranean: some 310 kilometers between Israel and Cyprus, about 900 kilometers between Cyprus and Crete, and about 310 additional kilometers between Crete and mainland Greece. Greek power grid operator IPTO has started construction of the Crete-mainland part, seen concluding by 2023. The Greek operator and Eurasia have been working closely to make sure the two cables link to each other efficiently, an IPTO official said. The European Union has recognized the cable as a "Project of Common Interest", categorizing it as a project it is willing to partly finance.


and even this


Elon Musk is getting into the Texas power market, with previously unrevealed construction of a gigantic battery connected to an ailing electric grid that nearly collapsed last month (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-03-08/tesla-is-plugging-a-secret-mega-battery-into-the-texas-grid). The move marks Tesla's first major foray into the epicenter of the U.S. energy economy. A Tesla subsidiary registered as Gambit Energy Storage LLC is quietly building a more than 100 megawatt energy storage project in Angleton, Texas, a town roughly 40 miles south of Houston. A battery that size could power about 20,000 homes on a hot summer day. Workers at the site kept equipment under cover and discouraged onlookers, but a Tesla logo could be seen on a worker's hard hat and public documents helped confirm the company's role. Property records on file with Brazoria County show Gambit shares the same address as a Tesla facility near the company's auto plant in Fremont, California. A filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission lists Gambit as a Tesla subsidiary. According to a document on the city of Angleton's website (http://angleton.tx.us/DocumentCenter/View/3793/Gambit-Energy-Storage-Park-FAQ?bidId=), the installation will use lithium iron phosphate batteries that are expected to last 10 to 20 years. The document says that it will generate around $1 million in property tax revenue for the city and the site will be unmanned but remotely monitored.

[Chris Parks]

Australia to Singapore interconnector driven by solar.

Australia to fast-track world's largest solar-battery project with grid link to Singapore | Recharge (https://www.rechargenews.com/transition/australia-to-fast-track-worlds-largest-solar-battery-project-with-grid-link-to-singapore/2-1-849688)

[Bushmiller]

Australia already has a DC connector between Tasmania and Victoria. The primary purpose was to ensure continuity of supply if the Hydro stations dried up. Unfortunately greed and the competitive market allowed the Tasmanian suppliers to export too much power to Victoria and when the submarine link damaged and was out of service for nearly a year Tasmania was in the mire (my euphemism does not really describe how serious the problem was: It was deep).

The link to Singapore does not yet have approval at the Asian end from reading the article Chris highlighted. 4500Km under sea is a lot of of enormous cable to get your money back on.

The Tesla battery scheduled for Texas is the same size as the battery installed in SA. Interesting to note that Texas has the largest electricity consumption of all the US states. I think it would be a little like attaching half a dozen cordless tool batteries to Tasmania. Having said that, we have to start somewhere: I don't think we should place too much store in what is another Tesla marketing exercise. 100MW for one hour: Phew!

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

How do the electrical generators price their power? Well, we have to remember that it is a competitive market and successive state governments said collectively that it would be good, because competition is good.

Careful what you wish for.

Traditionally power stations were situated within the load centres. So in Sydney there was Pyrmont for example and in Brisbane we had Tennyson. Various Powerhouse buildings were of course once power stations and now function as museums or theatres. However, people did not really want power stations belching smoke all over their clean washing and generally being an eyesore and in addition the cost of carting their fuel, which was coal, became increasingly expensive. So over time the installations were moved out towards the country and closer to the coal sources.

The other main requirement was water for cooling. For a long time stations were situated near the coast and used sea water for cooling. Lake MacQuarie was a good example of this. Eraring and Vales Point are still there and Wangi once was. The cost of their fuel is high because it has to be transported some distance. The most economical stations sit on top of an associated coal mine. Please be patient for a while longer as I am leading up to why some stations will close before others.

In my introductory sentence I questioned the price structure. The market is competitive and owners of stations wish to make a profit. The price the market will stand is moderated by the price at which your competitors are prepared to offer their product. Simple economics there: Supply and demand. Let us take a completely hypothetical station. I am thinking coal fired, but it need not be restricted to that. To make a profit we need to sell our electricity at a minimum of $75/MWhr. Our fuel supply costs $60 per tonne and we use half a tonne to generate one MW. This means we will still supply electricity down to a market price of $30/MWhr, because at least we are getting some revenue. Once the price goes below the cost of our fuel we are losing money and need to shut down. (I have rounded figures for simplicity)

The analogy we use is that if you own a truck, even if it sits in the yard it costs money (lease costs, driver wage etc).These are the fixed costs. Any money you get for a job lessens your loss while ever it is more than your fuel cost. Long term this is unsustainable, but short term it may tide you over until profitable jobs come along.

If the price goes below $30/MWhr we start to run back our supply and ideally we we stop generation completely, but for various reasons a coal fired station may not do this. Primarily because the costs associated with restarting are too high. Consequently the station wears the loss for a limited period in the hope it will recoup those losses at a later point in the day (or the week or the month etc..). At some point this method of operation is no longer viable so you can see that the stations with high fuel costs will be the first to go.

Equally you can see that the gas turbines (they still produce CO2 and can in no way be considered clean, green or otherwise environmentally friendly), which have the capability to shut down quickly have an advantage and in that regard are more flexible. However, their fuel cost is high, which is their disadvantage and will often preclude them from entering the market unless prices are high. Likewise, when the price goes negative, which it does, the solar can just switch off: Easy. The problem for them now is that this is the only time they can generate. A problem that they very likely never anticipated.

The sequence of power stations shutting down will be those with high fuel costs and then the less efficient stations. The stations that have formulated a transition plan towards renewable dominance will also be better placed and that plan may have many facets. The ostriches are doomed from the outset.

Regards
Paul

[Beardy]

Bushmiller it is refreshing to get the no nonsense state of play rather than the marketing hype and dribble from those with hidden agendas

I appreciate your informative posts

[Bushmiller]

This is a snapshot of the grid and spot prices from yesterday at 1125hrs yesterday:

490954

Do bear in mind this was just a snapshot that represented a five minute segment, but interesting to note that the two states with the most solar power , QLD and SA, were at $0 and $-190.

In QLD the thermal generators would have begun to reduce their load as fast as they are capable of and Solar station would have been considering switch off their panels. The SA situation was more severe. You may be asking how anybody can sustain negative prices. The reason is that this is not the whole story. The MWs are almost a true value, but I think the rooftop solar may not be included. The spot price is only for surplus power above the contracts. Contracts provide a reliable income source for the generators and a reasonable price for the consumers to insulate them from ridiculously high price spikes. In practice a generator's contracts may be around 50% of their capacity. They are usually reluctant to contract more than this as if they are unable honour the contract, they themselves have to purchase from the spot market. possibly at very high prices.

The prices in the other states I would guess are covering the cost of the fuel but are a long way short of profitability.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I received an email today from the Greens party announcing that the Yallourn Station in Victoria is closing down early. This was topical as Chris Parks had prompted this thread with his link questioning whether stations having to close was reality or media hype.

Initially the thoughts that went through my mind were that Victorian stations burn brown coal and are arguably very dirty in terms of pollution so it sort of made sense. The ancient Hazelwood station was shut down a while ago being one of the dirtiest stations of all time. However I read on and while it is true that it is shutting down, it will not be until 2028! This is the type of media hype that I believe borders on unconscionable. The article initially implied that this would be happening this year: Or perhaps in my innocent and all trusting mind I read that into it.

When reading such articles I think it is increasingly important to note where the information is coming from and the likelihood of an agenda or other vested interest. Very important to to see if something is proposed or actually happening and, as in the case of Yallourn, the timeline.

Some information on Yallourn, which interestingly states it's coal supply was due to run out in 2028!.

Yallourn Power Station - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yallourn_Power_Station)

Regards
Paul

Edit: One of my colleagues worked at Yallourn many years ago and he felt they had ample supplies of coal: More likely it is their current coal lease that expires in 2028.

[NCArcher]

I did the majority of my apprenticeship at the Yallourn power stations. Stations A and B were decommissioned long before I got there. I decommissioned C and D. And E was decommissioned while I was working at Loy Yang. I worked at W for a couple of years as a first and second year apprentice.
Paul I don't think the power stations have a coal lease as such. The coal mines only provide coal for the power stations and are owned by the same people. The power stations and mines used to be government owned but were sold off 20 odd years ago. Yallourn W is the only power station left taking coal from the Yallourn mine.
Incidently, I was born in the Yallourn open cut mine. There used to be a town called Yallourn that was constructed to house the workers who were building the power stations. When the mine needed to expand to access different areas of coal, the town was demolished and became part of the open cut mine. In my first six months as an apprentice we were sent into the now abandoned town to strip electrical equipment from the buildings before they were flattened. I've still got some signs from the theatre. We removed all the projection equipment and sent it to a university for whatever film making course they were teaching. That was a very long time ago.

[Lappa]

Thanks for this thread Bushmiller. Just a question.
Maybe I’m reading it wrong but I can’t see $-190 for SA? I see $190. Does the fact that it’s in brackets mean it’s a negative figure?

[Bohdan]

The brackets around the value is the accountant's way of designating a negative value.

[woodPixel]

Thanks for this thread Bushmiller. Just a question.
Maybe I’m reading it wrong but I can’t see $-190 for SA? I see $190. Does the fact that it’s in brackets mean it’s a negative figure?

Brackets are an accounting function indicating a negative number.

[Bushmiller]

Thanks for this thread Bushmiller. Just a question.
Maybe I’m reading it wrong but I can’t see $-190 for SA? I see $190. Does the fact that it’s in brackets mean it’s a negative figure?

Hi Lappa

Yes that is exactly right. We used to provide these graphics with a "minus" sign, but I think the accountants got to the traders and said you must place the negative figures in brackets. :rolleyes:

That "snapshot" updates every five minutes with revised information.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I did the majority of my apprenticeship at the Yallourn power stations. Stations A and B were decommissioned long before I got there. I decommissioned C and D. And E was decommissioned while I was working at Loy Yang. I worked at W for a couple of years as a first and second year apprentice.
Paul I don't think the power stations have a coal lease as such. The coal mines only provide coal for the power stations and are owned by the same people. The power stations and mines used to be government owned but were sold off 20 odd years ago. Yallourn W is the only power station left taking coal from the Yallourn mine.
Incidently, I was born in the Yallourn open cut mine. There used to be a town called Yallourn that was constructed to house the workers who were building the power stations. When the mine needed to expand to access different areas of coal, the town was demolished and became part of the open cut mine. In my first six months as an apprentice we were sent into the now abandoned town to strip electrical equipment from the buildings before they were flattened. I've still got some signs from the theatre. We removed all the projection equipment and sent it to a university for whatever film making course they were teaching. That was a very long time ago.

Tony

Thanks for that piece of personal insight. The coal leases are not really my area of expertise. I was basing my assumption on the situation for our power station, which means I may have things around the wrong way. Millmerran power station owns the land on which it sits and a huge tract around the station, which includes our coal mine. Like Yallourn, the coal is only used for the power station. However, in Australia you only own the land to about 600mm down in the ground (I think that is right, but if I have the depth wrong the principle is right) unless you are fortunate enough to have an original title without it having changed hands. I know of one instance of this down in the Muswellbrook area.

Otherwise you have to apply for a lease as you do not automatically own the mineral rights. I suspect that at Yallourn, they will not apply to continue a new lease. It will lapse. Consequently, the Wikipedia reference is slightly misleading. Later on the information clarifies that a section will become exhausted and significant infrastructure has to be altered to allow access to a new section. This combination of falling prices and increased cost of accessing coal presumeably is the reason for hastening the demise bringing the closure date forward from 2032 to 2028.

It should be noted that up to 1480MW of replacement power will need to be sourced. To explain this, if that were to be replaced by solar, I suggest that at least four times that amount of solar PV would be needed: 1480MW for the immediate sunlight hour direct replacement and another 4440MW for when the sun does not shine during the "sunless" hours and times of cloud cover. Also, and this is even more of a contentious issue, we need the facility to store that energy for release at night. It represents a lot of pumped hydro, batteries or Hydrogen storage. We certainly don't have that yet. Pit this against the Tesla battery (100MW for one hour or the proposed 300MW battery at Liddell). It is a pittance. To store that amount of energy for sixteen hours you would need upwards of 25,000 Tesla sized batteries.

That is a lot in renewable terms and work needs to commence right now! And we are only talking about a single station.

Regards
Paul

[russ57]

Most interesting discussion. Just a couple of observations I'd like to contribute.
-at the moment I see the primary use of batteries is as frequency stability (because they can start feeding the grid in milliseconds, which is better than spinning reserves in some cases, giving time to bring up gas/coal /hydro. But as noted the actual storage capacity is minuscule.
- We ("society") really need a concerted effort to develop storage at scale to complement renewables. Or completely reengineer the grid to have local storage everywhere - a battery in every suburb.

Or just discover practical fusion.. Free energy everywhere :D

-My current electricity retailer passes on wholesale prices, complete with app which shows the current price in 5min intervals. Fascinating to watch the variation. Currently 20c, forecast to reach 21 later then drop in 19 overnight, which is unusual as overnight is usually 18 or less. Cool sunny days may see prices drop to 10 or lower, and I have seen negative. It can also peak quite high, in which case the plan is to switch stuff off... Mild summer meant that didn't happen.

Theoretically, everyone managing load should help manage peak demand.

-Ncarcher, sounds like you could have been in the valley when I was growing up. Also born in Yallourn but lived in Morwell. Father and brother were both SECV, as was half the town. Brother retired /redundanted from loy yang b last year. Instrument maker then unit operator. He doesn't like agl...



Russ

[Bushmiller]

-at the moment I see the primary use of batteries is as frequency stability (because they can start feeding the grid in milliseconds, which is better than spinning reserves in some cases, giving time to bring up gas/coal /hydro. But as noted the actual storage capacity is minuscule.


Russ

Russ

You are right on the money.

It is probably true that for the moment there insufficient batteries even for this aspect. In Queensland it is now obligatory for each station to have PFC (Primary Frequency Control), but thermal stations are nowhere near as responsive as the battery or hydro power for that matter, which was the market leader until the advent of these large batteries. tesla is not the only battery: It is just the one that got all the publicity.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

I harp on about CAES/LAES but it solves literally every problem presented so far.

It simply needs to be implemented on a per suburb basis.

Liquid Air Energy Storage: A Power Grid Battery Using Regular Old Ambient Air | Hackaday (https://hackaday.com/2020/07/24/liquid-air-energy-storage-a-power-grid-battery-using-regular-old-ambient-air/)

Climate emission killer: construction begins on world’s biggest liquid air battery | Renewable energy | The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/18/worlds-biggest-liquid-air-battery-starts-construction-in-uk)

I was chatting with the CEO only a little while back and he said Canberra was ideal for this storage. Three of the big units can supply 100% of Canberra residential energy needs for three days.

Naturally we'd want some smarts built into the network, such as shutdown or throttling built into residential air conditioning, etc.... But my 5 year old Daikin already has such tech built in.... Just unused.

Surely we can do better.

Build these bulk LAES storages at core areas and pesto... One small part of the problem solved.

[BobL]

My understanding is that liquid air storage is relatively inefficient (25-30%) and only become more efficient/viable when colocated near unused cold storage ( eg a LNG plant) and waste heat supplies (eg coal fire power stationS). As these are going to eventually be phased out, investors are nervous about putting long terms funds into these developments. Despite this they appear to have a part to play in the transition to renewables process, at least they don't leave a mess behind.

[woodPixel]

I'll try to find the fact sheets.

From memory, there were two systems. One was 68% efficient and the other 80%.

The waste heat and cold were either stored or on-sold to industry.

There was a discussion on the storage of the heat and how it was used in an exchanger prior to the gas being "released", thereby reducing the cold generated from the decompression. The doco was quite extensive. This was at the time they were hunting for investors. I was terribly interested, but Sumitomo took the lions share :(

What I really liked was that the facility is quite passive. The ideas floated were for the whole thing to be pre-fabbed elsewhere and assembled by the locals (much like that excellent bridge of your cousins Bob). The bits were not hard to make or composed of exotic materials or complex fabrication. Extra capacity can be added simply by slapping more storage/compress/decomp on as needed.

My impression is that an entire facility could be built for $50 mil... but this number was a super-early-stage-working-stuff-out number.... again, my impression was this would rapidly drop to 1/5th that.

The other thing I especially loved is it quickly overcame much of the "what if" arguments about solar/wind. Sure, the obvious solution to no-wind is to overbuild in multiple regions.... but imagine, just for a moment, that a combo solution of solar-wind-CAES were installed, then run the thing like crazy when its sunny/windy and run off CAES during the night (bushmiller would know these numbers).... but I'd reckon night use is only a fraction of daytime use.

One other thing that was floated is there are areas with empty oil reserves, cave systems, salt mines, etc, that can be used as enormous stores of compressed air. This is the next argument of many.... "what if" you run out of air..... well, obviously a few above ground tanks can only store so much, even if chained together... but a coal mine... or old salt mine!!! Those things are vast..... depleted gas reserves would be ideal and there are lots of those around thanks to the curse of fracking and the pure evil of coal-seam gas...


The CAES systems were envisaged to be set up in neighbourhoods. They are silent. One could easily be hidden within a residential area, or within a trendy looking fascade/building or behind some nice hedges... :)

I'd also imagine that the local-storage thing would also make the electrical engineers happy - big changes to the mega-grid are reduced as capacity is local (??).

[woodPixel]

This wiki is pretty interesting: Compressed-air energy storage - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed-air_energy_storage)

One thought with efficiency.... this really matters when one is charging the system with gas, coal or nukes... but becomes less so when charging with wind and solar.

After all, its designed to take the excess energy, at the cheapest price, for resale later at higher prices - just like the Tesla battery.

[Lappa]

Interesting article pointing to problems with the uptake success of solar in certain emergencies.

Power granted to switch off household solar in SA to prevent statewide blackout - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-19/solar-boom-puts-sa-at-risk-of-another-statewide-blackout/12372558)

[Bushmiller]

Each quarter the market operator, AEMO, produces a comprehensive report. The latest full report for Q4 2020 can be viewed here (https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/major-publications/qed/2020/qed-q4-2020.pdf?la=en&hash=BE12D7DEBE790078B5E7C047FB7BD0BB), but these are two summary pages for those of you who do not wish to wade through the pages. However, if you have a burning (not fossil fueled I hope) interest I recommend the read.

491392491393

There are some notable points in the summary including maximum and minimum demands and the fact that, for this quarter SA was the cheapest state displacing QLD. Also of note is that SA is nearly self sufficient in renewables, although they cannot go 100% for the moment. I have some snap shots of yesterdays power, which may be of interest and highlight this aspect. I will include them in another post.

If you wish to look at or compare any quarter load "AEMO Quarterly Dynamics report" into you search engine.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

These are some snaphots of the way prices went yesterday during the day. One of the aspects I wished to emphasis was the volatility of the market even without a major disturbance such as a large unit tripping. Following on from my previous post it is interesting to note that although electricity usually flows from a low priced state to a higher state (indicated by the direction of the chevrons) at all times, even when prices were negative in SA (figures in brackets) at least one interconnector was flowing from high priced NSW into SA. This is for frequency stability. Generally the solar and wind is unable to provide frequency control. The addition of large battery storage in the future may well overcome this problem, but it is not there now.

491394491395491396491397491398491399491400491401

The time of day is indicated in the QLD area just above SA. You may need to double click on the pix to read details more clearly.

These snapshots update every five minutes and some I have included just to show how the market can change in that single period. The load indicated is precise but the prices are only for the spot market element and do not include contacts, which are negotiated by the generators and their customers.

Generally prices were stable through most states except SA

Daylight saving mitigates the electricity demand during peak periods in that it is staggered. The morning and evening peak periods tend to be when solar is either non-existent or has low productivity.

Please feel free to ask questions.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Some of you may remember discussion about a new coal fired power station proposed for the old and now defunct Collinsville site in QLD. I can't remember where this occurred, but there again I am having difficulty remembering last week. At the time I commented " What on earth are they thinking? A new coal fired power station...in Queensland?!!!!"

It appears that it is dead in the water: Actually it never even got to the water and the alleged indigenous company "Shine" is not very indigenous at all or at least from an Australian perspective. My memory, such as it is, thought there was a $1 million grant up for grabs for a feasibility study. That seems to have been $3.3m, but the company concerned, Shine" has failed miserably to even meet the conditions of the grant despite being prodded in the right direction! Full details of the exposé:

Another Taylor shocker: Auditor lambasts dodgy handout to energy company that couldn’t do the job (msn.com) (https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/another-taylor-shocker-auditor-lambasts-dodgy-handout-to-energy-company-that-couldn-t-do-the-job/ar-BB1eJtlu?ocid=msedgntp)

As always, I suggest with reports such as this that you look at the origins of the article and make your own assessment as to hidden agendas. As it happens, I don't think this Crikey-originated article has an agenda other than exposing a ludicrous rort at best and a bizarre incompetence at worst. However, Crikey is not friends with the CO2 brigade.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Another comment I would make when considering new power plants is that because they are privately owned they require finance. To qualify for finance they have to have a viable business plan indicating they will be able to repay their loan. In Australia I don't think any of the banks will even re-finance loans for fossil fuelled stations let alone fund a new station and that includes gas. Almost certainly they would have to go offshore for finance. The reasoning is quite simple: The banks see a good chance of those companies defaulting on their loan as fossil is phased out. As it is the loan may only run for a limited period of time

This is the reason I keep harping on about any project being commercially viable: Not viable? Forget it, no matter how potentially exciting it may be.

Welcome to the commercial world.

Regards
Paul

[BobL]

Another comment I would make when considering new power plants is that because they are privately owned they require finance. To qualify for finance they have to have a viable business plan indicating they will be able to repay their loan. In Australia I don't think any of the banks will even re-finance loans for fossil fuelled stations let alone fund a new station and that includes gas. Almost certainly they would have to go offshore for finance. The reasoning is quite simple: The banks see a good chance of those companies defaulting on their loan as fossil is phased out. As it is the loan may only run for a limited period of time

Thanks for your posts Paul.

The other massive financial investment entity that is increasingly divesting itself of greenhouse gas producing activities are super funds. Members can increasingly require which areas of investment their contributions can be invested in and many choose not to invest theirs in non green technologies.
This decision is not without financial significance.
SWMBO and I both have funds in the same super fund and her funds are under a "green" investment option whereas mine are under an "open - green and non-green" option and SWMBO's strategy has consistently outperformed mine since 2105.

[Bushmiller]

Thanks for your posts Paul.

The other massive financial investment entity that is increasingly divesting itself of greenhouse gas producing activities are super funds. Members can increasingly require which areas of investment their contributions can be invested in and many choose not to invest theirs in non green technologies.
This decision is not without financial significance.
SWMBO and I both have funds in the same super fund and her funds are under a "green" investment option whereas mine are under an "open - green and non-green" option and SWMBO's strategy has consistently outperformed mine since 2105.

Bob

That is most interesting. Only last night a friend and colleague, who is far more financially savvy than I, mentioned that the super funds with female CEOs appear to outperform the rest! probably not a topic for this thread, but I couldn't help but toss that out. I will look into the super options.

regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

New investments certainly are available.

I took two positions in these ETF's last week: CLNE and ERTH...

CLNE - VanEck Vectors Global Clean Energy ETF (https://www.vaneck.com.au/etf/equity/clne/snapshot/)
Climate Change Innovation ETF | ASX: ERTH | BetaShares (https://www.betashares.com.au/fund/climate-change-innovation-etf/)

So far they are flogging around, but volumes are thin. The Authorised Participants will pick up soon. I'd imagine once they are marketed a bit they'll attract more interest. The makeup of the ETFs holdings are interesting.


On funding environmental polluters, it superficially seems the banks have become moral.... but I seriously DOUBT this is the case. They are simply backing the horse most likely to win.

Banks have no morals. They are blood sucking vampires who would sell their grandmothers kidneys for a few quick pieces of silver. Their only motive is pure profit. The fact they have aligned their public stance to being "Good" is purely circumstantial.... i.e pure marketing.

[Beardy]

New investments certainly are available.

I took two positions in these ETF's last week: CLNE and ERTH...

CLNE - VanEck Vectors Global Clean Energy ETF (https://www.vaneck.com.au/etf/equity/clne/snapshot/)
Climate Change Innovation ETF | ASX: ERTH | BetaShares (https://www.betashares.com.au/fund/climate-change-innovation-etf/)

So far they are flogging around, but volumes are thin. The Authorised Participants will pick up soon. I'd imagine once they are marketed a bit they'll attract more interest. The makeup of the ETFs holdings are interesting.


On funding environmental polluters, it superficially seems the banks have become moral.... but I seriously DOUBT this is the case. They are simply backing the horse most likely to win.

Banks have no morals. They are blood sucking vampires who would sell their grandmothers kidneys for a few quick pieces of silver. Their only motive is pure profit. The fact they have aligned their public stance to being "Good" is purely circumstantial.... i.e pure marketing.

Whilst your take on the banks might be true I think it is a bit rich to criticise them for doing what basically everybody else does. They are a business and in it for the money just like every other business and every employee of those businesses. Can’t see they are any better or worse than the rest

[woodPixel]

I come at it from the banks are not what 99% of people think they are.

They receive a unique capability to literally mint money. Their business is both protected by law to restrict and reduce competition. Their funding is essentially free and is both protected from competition and guaranteed. Their retail operations support their behind-the-sceens money market operations and is again funded by the public via deposit guarantees and government backing for when the wheels fall off.

There is no other business like banking. No other business can do what they do legally and they abuse both their implied public trust and also their position as money maker, market creators and agents of arbitrage. They are hopelessly conflicted and abuse this conflict of interested nakedly.

Their history is a litany of abuse, scams, shams, ripoffs and private profiteering.


Now, IF their retail operations were perfectly firewalled from their private banking operations it would be not a problem. But it is not. Retail operations are the fattest slowest milk-fed cow their is and they raid this obscene coffer in order to make private money. The markets are not benefited and nor are the retail client, the depositors, borrowers as they are paying (essentially) to insure private functions.

The moral hazard is obscene.

I'd also argue that shareholders are not rewarded either. That's a bigger issue.

[Chris Parks]

We have all seen the many new battery technologies that were going to magically be the next best thing and cheaper than sliced bread but strictly for large grid use this may be one answer. The first installation is now being planned and built in the US.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRyo0Nr7CrY

[Bushmiller]

Chris

Thanks for that link. It looks promising. I liked the fact that he was on top of the "Price performance ratio" and that he "Thought about cost from day one."

Edit: I would like to know more about initially raising the temp to the required 700°C and to what extent that temp is maintained by cycling the battery. In other words how sustaining it is. i was just a little scepticsl that it might be able to hold temperature and supply heating for external use. That just seemed a little too good to be true.



Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

The single thing that impressed me was that they are putting into service the first unit. That they got it out of the lab and developed the design, production and manufacturing processes in ten years was fairly impressive also. I suppose the heat maintenance levels might be IP he does not want to talk about except in the most general terms.

[woodPixel]

wow. Maybe too wow.

There was no discussion of voltage differences, current, cathode/anode deterioration, etc.

The temperature thing is an easy thing to do.

I REALLY loved the chemistry - it was instantaneously obvious.... self refining too.. gods I loved that.... but let me find the all-important voltage/amp equation!


edit: Give me a BREAK! This can't be real... Technology: Ambri (https://ambri.com/technology/)

This is incredible. It can't be real. If it is - adios coal, nuclear and hello electrification of everything..... Crikey, these things can be put into the basements of buildings, or even a few for the outback town/farm..... Shipping is as trivial as a container, plugging in is trivial, charging is trivial, getting to capacity is trivial. Its all too good to be true.

[Chris Parks]

It would seem to be a company that is ripe for a sell out to a bigger company and that may be what they had in mind all along. The big players must be looking at them with cheque books in hand.

[Lyle]

ABC news rhis am. Seems the AEMC is going to reccomend the removal of the ban on charging households with solar generation a fee for exporting to the grid. Something about reducing the solar gridlocks.
Am I being cynical in thinking this is just another profit adjustment??
Australians with rooftop solar panels could soon be charged for exporting power into the grid, under proposed changes - ABC News (https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2021-03-25/australians-with-rooftop-solar-charged-export-electricity-grid/100026336)

[Chris Parks]

Unfortunately the grid issues that exist are true and need to be managed as outlined in the linked story. Batteries are most probably the ultimate answer and if they were subsidised instead of addressing the grid infrastructure issues that might be an answer. Maybe grid installed larger batteries such as I linked to above could work and not one big one. Times are changing and there will have to be flexibility on both sides of the equation from both the generation and retail sides.

[BobL]

Here's a link to an interestingg "room temperature" liquid metal battery.

New Room-Temperature Liquid-Metal Battery Could Be the Path to Powering the Future - UT News (https://news.utexas.edu/2020/07/06/new-room-temperature-liquid-metal-battery-could-be-the-path-to-powering-the-future/)

It's only at the "just invented" stage so they have a few issues to sort out.
Thing is, this is all in its infancy - about where morse code was compared to modern coms.

[Chris Parks]

Unfortunately until battery technology hits the streets it is vapour ware as the kiddies say. Many different labs are pursuing many different technologies including some very substantial research into solid state in Eastern Europe. The one I linked to seems to be the first to take the battery out of the small cylinder form and get it into production at this stage.

For those who want to understand more about the grid issues this link on what is known as the Duck Curve is worth a read The Duck Curve | NuScale Power (https://www.nuscalepower.com/environment/renewables/the-duck-curve)

[Bushmiller]

Lyle

Interesting report. I notice that this suggestion is coming primarily from the SA system where there has been the largest uptake of domestic and commercial solar in Australia as a proportion of the State's demand. By that I mean QLD may have the same level of solar generation (I am just surmising as I have not checked the figures) but that is in a state where the demand is three times as much so the ratio is quite different. The issue in SA is that under some circumstances there is more solar generation than demand. Not all the time but is is fast approaching that situation and the article mentions that in one instance 100% of demand was supplied by solar (no wind?). In commercial systems the owners will just shut the panels down, but in a domestic situation this is impractical: For example, you may not be at home to switch your system off. No doubt down the track this could be modified to switch it off remotely from a mobile phone for example.

However, it does look as though they are recognising the situation where at times they will have to limit the solar generation because there is too much. They can do this via the commercial installations with the spot price, but it has no effect with domestic solar PV generation. My guess, and it is a guess, is that the commercial companies are starting to say they are disadvantaged by this arrangement and they are lobbying to restrict the domestic generators. Having said that I don't quite see how a price penalty on rooftop solar will limit generation: It still has to be turned off somehow.

The last comment I would make is that right at the end of the article it states that this is some years away!

Chris

I think the installation of domestic battery storage could be the next level of solar as soon as the batteries reduce in price to an affordable level. The Ambri battery looks very hopeful in that regard, but it is early days.

Regards
Paul

[Lyle]

What sticks with me is that apparently they knew this situation was approaching some 10-15 years ago. But now, their solution is to penalise the "generator". I wonder how those big solar companies will work around the penalties.

[Chris Parks]

The really interesting part of all this is recent announcements concerning massive roof top solar installations on commercial building roof tops by a company recently....Move to build grid-scale solar on industrial rooftops across Australia (https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/move-to-build-grid-scale-solar-on-industrial-rooftops-across-australia-20210113-p56tv1.html)

This most probably follows on by a NSW Government decision in 2020.....NSW amends laws to pave the way for rooftop solar and big batteries – pv magazine Australia (https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2020/04/25/nsw-amends-laws-to-pave-the-way-for-rooftop-solar-and-big-batteries/)

Would I be cynical in noting that one of the principals in the company is an ex Liberal Premier of NSW and the plan was facilitated by a change of legislation by the current Liberal Government in NSW. I suspect if solar feeds back into the grid became a really big problem in NSW then it would be the residential systems that get turned off and not the large systems proposed in the first link.

I am more inclined to think that smaller multiple batteries installed at various places might be an idea that will fly. For instance every small town could have one and for some it would ensure a more reliable supply in times of fire, flood etc or simply that the grid supplying the town is old and things get broken. Smaller batteries are more easily transported and installed than one large one and if the one large battery has problems then the whole grid suffers but that is not an issue with multiple small batteries.

[russ57]

I quite like Redflow – Sustainable Energy Storage (https://redflow.com/) zinc bromine flow battery. 10kwh storage, 100% depth of discharge.
Getting a lot of business for remote area power, eg telecoms, wilderness etc.

[Lyle]

Weren't the distribution systems sold off to private consortiums. Instead of restricting the use of domestic solar, why not fix the systems to cope. We're supposed to be the clever country after all. Our climate lends nicely to solar.
Why not embrace that and design new developments to be capable of supporting solar. Maybe suburban storage of excess capacity.
Simplistic I know. But that'd make more sense to me than trying to screw more money out of those with domestic solar.
Those without solar would also benefit and not be left behind.
There must be other solutions.

[Bushmiller]

Under government ownership there were the generators and the distributors, who owned the transmission lines, substations etc. For years the government had reaped huge revenues and when they decided to privatise the entities looked extremely attractive from a revenue point of view. The government received a huge (one-off) windfall and the buyers inherited a system that had not been maintained sufficiently and was desperately in need of upgrades.

It is probably true to say that the system was never designed to cope with rooftop solar, but the problems are exacerbated by having an antiquated system in the first place. The distribution companies are blaming solar, but that is actually only part of the story and to a large extent a convenient excuse.

While I think that the next stage of domestic solar may well be the inclusion of batteries, that will only happen when the batteries drop to an economic price point, which has yet to be determined, and we householders have the ability to switch off their solar through the day thus enabling them to charge their batteries and the facility to release their stored energy to the grid at night at a higher rate.

There are two aspects of solar generation I have to check. The first is that when solar generation statistics are quoted they often don't include rooftop power supplied to the grid at any one moment in time. It is difficult to monitor this for the moment. There is information, of course, about how much rooftop solar is installed, but at any one time it will supply varying amounts of power. This is because some is being consumed in the household, the day is cloudy or the system is dirty and not generating to it's full potential. There is clearly a means of working out for revenue purposes how much a system has supplied, but this does appear to translate into a minute by minute figure.

The second aspect is that i have been told that the commercial installation have a price guarantee. The figure that has been indicated to me is $80/MWhr. That figure, if it is true, is nearly twice the average wholesale price at the time of writing. I stress that i need to verufy this, but if true debunks the statement that solar is now cheaper than the traditional mainstream supplies. I should also point out that the original incentives for rooftop solar are still in place and these vary between 44c/KWhr and 52c/KWhr. That equates to $440 & $520/MWhr!!!. I think those subsidies are due to run out within the next five years. The protagonists of solar power, including myself, tend to forget this.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

... Would I be cynical in noting that one of the principals in the company is an ex Liberal Premier of NSW and the plan was facilitated by a change of legislation by the current Liberal Government in NSW.

Fascinating isn't it.

Coal is the only solution for a COALition government. Capitalism is the only solution the Liberals preach. Greenies are bad. Solar/wind/etc cannot ever work they preach...

Interestingly, ALL Liberals seem to instantly turn into green-loving devotees once leaving office. Their tune instantly changes "wE wErE mIsUnDeRsToOd"... After fleecing the public purse for permanent pensions.... personal investments that benefit by public legislation changes... and Coal is suddenly evil and Solar/wind/whatever becomes an existential necessity.

It seems to me that all ex-politicians should be permanently banned from investing in ANYTHING that had anything to with their former portfolios - forever.

Liberals catch a sudden case of greenie-communism on leaving office, dont they!



BTW.... I LOVE batteries, solar, wind, geo, recycling, trees..... drove back to Canberra on Friday and coming down to Lake George was the most beautiful sight of hundreds of windmills leisurely spinning in the far distance... those things must be utterly stupendous.... magnificent.

[Beardy]

So where do we stand with reducing greenhouse emissions with our current state of play?

In summary as I understand it, we currently have a situation where we have renewables somewhat supplying / supplementing our power requirements during the day but still require coal fired stations to run at their normal capacity to take up the slack during peak loads and at night but are heavily discounting or giving away their excess power when the sun is shining
Does that in effect mean we haven’t actually reduced our energy producing carbon footprint or have I got it wrong?

[woodPixel]

Ironically, with prices going down our electricity monopolist has decided to INCREASE prices....

Electricity prices are falling. So why are Canberrans''' household power bills about to rise? - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-06/why-canberra-electricity-bills-are-about-to-increase/100050232)

I can see quite a bit of this corporate double-speak occurring soon.

[Bushmiller]

So where do we stand with reducing greenhouse emissions with our current state of play?

In summary as I understand it, we currently have a situation where we have renewables somewhat supplying / supplementing our power requirements during the day but still require coal fired stations to run at their normal capacity to take up the slack during peak loads and at night but are heavily discounting or giving away their excess power when the sun is shining
Does that in effect mean we haven’t actually reduced our energy producing carbon footprint or have I got it wrong?

Beardy

You are correct that for the moment solar only replaces during the sunlight hours and wind only replaces when the wind blows, but any time this is taking place carbon emissions are being reduced as it takes the place of fossil fuel generation. The issue is that it is not enough as for about three quarters of the day only fossil powered generators have the ability to supply the grid with electricity. Solar, for example and to take one renewable is fast approaching 100% of it's ability unless a viable storage technique is devised.

If you like, stage one is pretty much completed, but there is no real vision for stage two other than something needs to be done yesterday.

Regards
Paul

Regards
Paul

[Beardy]

Paul what I am basically asking is are we burning less coal with this solar and wind energy available now or does it consume the same amount of coal just keeping it running to meet peak load periods ?

[Bushmiller]

Paul what I am basically asking is are we burning less coal with this solar and wind energy available now or does it consume the same amount of coal just keeping it running to meet peak load periods ?

Beardy

We are burning less coal. Electricity is only generated to the level of demand. The major difference is that fossil fueled generators will keep their units running at a reduced load but even that load is below what would ordinarily be considered economic. This translates to a reduced cost to the consumer , if it is passed on, as well as reduced revenue for the generator and an overall reduction in emissions. Certainly as time goes on the thermal generators will have to devise strategies to drop their minimum loads to well below levels of the past. It won't be easy for everyone. Some will pack up their bags and leave the market.

Regards
Paul

[Beardy]

Beardy

We are burning less coal. Electricity is only generated to the level of demand. The major difference is that fossil fueled generators will keep their units running at a reduced load but even that load is below what would ordinarily be considered economic. This translates to a reduced cost to the consumer , if it is passed on, as well as reduced revenue for the generator and an overall reduction in emissions. Certainly as time goes on the thermal generators will have to devise strategies to drop their minimum loads to well below levels of the past. It won't be easy for everyone. Some will pack up their bags and leave the market.

Regards
Paul

Thanks for the clarification on that and good to know there is a reduction in emissions

[Chris Parks]

While not exactly pertinent to the thread I found this interesting


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZBaDle5NbU

[Lappa]

News today is the building of a new natural gas and hydrogen (small percentage to start with) fuelled 300MW power station at Tallawarra in NSW.
Being in the industry Paul, what are your thoughts on this unit re size as it’s supposed to take up the slack after Liddell is decommissioned.
Is it large enough?

[Bushmiller]

News today is the building of a new natural gas and hydrogen (small percentage to start with) fuelled 300MW power station at Tallawarra in NSW.
Being in the industry Paul, what are your thoughts on this unit re size as it’s supposed to take up the slack after Liddell is decommissioned.
Is it large enough?

Lappa

I had heard something like this was proposed and frankly I think it is laughable on at least two counts. Firstly, gas, natural or otherwise, is a fossil fuel. It produces carbon emissions. What part of greenhouse gas does the government not understand?

Secondly Liddell, where I once worked, has four 500MW units, although I don't know how many are still functioning today. I have it my mind that one may have been de-commissioned following a disaster, but certainly don't know that for certain. So even those people with a poor understanding of maths will see that 300MW is not going to replace 2000MW or even 1500MW.

Who is going to build this station and who is going to provide the finance? Is it likely that a private investor is going to put up the hand and with whose money? My understanding today is that no financial institutions in Australia are willing to finance fossil fuelled power. I am presuming Tallawarra is being touted as it is the site of a very old station and may have some infrastructure still in place. I am also cynically going to suggest that it is a crucial electoral seat, but again I will leave that to the political experts to investigate.

I have said so many times, look into the agenda behind all this statements. So little happens for the greater good and so much for individual gain.

Regards
Paul

[Lappa]

Heres a link to an ABC article. I read it in the Daily Telegraph but I can’t link that as you need to be a subscriber.

Australia'''s first net-zero hybrid power station gets the green light - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-04/australia-first-net-zero-hybrid-power-station/100113910)

[Bushmiller]

Thanks for that link Lappa.

It looks to me as though they plan to run it on gas until a hydrogen supply is available. Hydrogen is OK provided it is produced by electricity and in turn that electricity is from renewables. If not you have gone around in a circle and lost efficiency in the process (all processes have some degree of loss).

A little further reading shows that the units at Liddell have been de-rated to 420MW each which makes 1680MW by my count and not 500MW as stated in the article:

"The project will be fast-tracked to be operational by 2023-24 in a bid to help ensure reliable electricity supplies to the grid once the Liddell coal-fired 500-megawatt plant in the Hunter Valley closes."

I do get very agitated with the mis quoting of facts that are there for everybody to see.

I also note that the plant is an open cycle project. That is inefficient and in fact it is only marginally less polluting that the best coal fired stations. The best coal fired station carbon intensity is 9 (reflects 9 tonnes of CO2 per MW/hr), while an open cycle gas plant intensity is 8 (8 tonnes of CO2 per MW/hr).

A closed cycle gas unit with an HRSG (Heat Recovery Steam Generator) situated in the exhaust gases will have an intensity of around 6 (6 tonnes of CO2 perMW/hr).

It is a pity the government cannot see it's way to channelling their extensive efforts to maintain carbon producing power into non carbon producing technology. Perhaps they should not have progressively defunded the CSIRO.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

It is a pity the government cannot see it's way to channelling their extensive efforts to maintain carbon producing power into non carbon producing technology. Perhaps they should not have progressively defunded the CSIRO.

Unfortunately politicians are short sighted individuals who are centred on one thing and that is staying in power and ignore the consequences of that altogether. They are a curious bunch of people as most of them have little or a very limited skill set or qualifications for the job but usually no qualification at all. One qualification they all have is how to avoid taking responsibility for anything that goes wrong from their decision making or lack of it.

[yvan]

Unfortunately politicians are short sighted individuals who are centred on one thing and that is staying in power and ignore the consequences of that altogether. They are a curious bunch of people as most of them have little or a very limited skill set or qualifications for the job but usually no qualification at all. One qualification they all have is how to avoid taking responsibility for anything that goes wrong from their decision making or lack of it.

Chris,

The perfect description of a muppet !!!!

Cheers,
Yvan

[yvan]

Well, while Bushmiller talks about power plant outputs in the mega's, we are attempting to improve the output of our 20-pannel PV system by having mini-inverters installed as we have 2 trees shading some of the panels during part of the day. Time will tell if this was a good decision!

As a general observation, I am more than miffed, being polite, to be told that our PV system creates a problem rather than solves one...

There we was, in our innocence, dreaming of making a contribution to improving the current health of our planet no less when the Tasmanian government introduced a power feed-back incentive scheme to encourage the locals to go solar, right at the time we were extending our modest abode.

This is the same government who then decided to reduce the buy-back incentive from 28c to 6c/kW. This of course went down like a lead balloon, to the extent that the original decision was reviewed so that, for current beneficiaries, the reduction was stepped from 28c to 13c to 6c over a period of time.

Sorry but I don't get it: one minute there is this attractive offer to install PV systems but now they are creating a problem...go figure!!!

The price of energy is becoming a political football with allowances being distributed to pensioners etc. Sooner or later the crunch will come when true power charges will have to be passed as the cost of such allowances becomes prohibitive.

I'm off me soap box!

Cheers,
Yvan

[yvan]

Well, while Bushmiller talks about power plant outputs in the mega's, we are attempting to improve the output of our 20-pannel PV system by having mini-inverters installed as we have 2 trees shading some of the panels during part of the day. Time will tell if this was a good decision!

As a general observation, I am more than miffed, being polite, to be told that our PV system creates a problem rather than solves one...

There we was, in our innocence, dreaming of making a contribution to improving the current health of our planet no less when the Tasmanian government introduced a power feed-back incentive scheme to encourage the locals to go solar, right at the time we were extending our modest abode.

This is the same government who then decided to reduce the buy-back incentive from 28c to 6c/kW. This of course went down like a lead balloon, to the extent that the original decision was reviewed so that, for current beneficiaries, the reduction was stepped from 28c to 13c to 6c over a period of time.

Sorry but I don't get it: one minute there is this attractive offer to install PV systems but now they are creating a problem...go figure!!!

The price of energy is becoming a political football with allowances being distributed to pensioners etc. Sooner or later the crunch will come when true power charges will have to be passed as the cost of such allowances becomes prohibitive.

I'm off me soap box!

Cheers,
Yvan

[Chris Parks]

Until governments and the electrical suppliers and generation companies get of their collective backsides and integrate storage into the grid then things won't change. It is a classic example of short term thinking and because the grid was developed as an instantaneous supplier unlike the water supply for instance which uses storage to supply demand.

[woodPixel]

Yvan, I see that Tesla in the USA will only sell bundled PV's with a battery system now.

Selling to the utilities for 6 cents a Kwh seems a bit pissy, so consuming your own photons will be the answer for the future.

If, after all, the government sees citizens and customers as its enemies, its time to lower the portcullis and provide ones own services! :)

Tesla Powerwall 2: A complete 2021 buyers guide | Solar Choice (https://www.solarchoice.net.au/blog/tesla-powerwall-a-complete-2019-buyers-guide/)

[Bushmiller]

Well, while Bushmiller talks about power plant outputs in the mega's, we are attempting to improve the output of our 20-pannel PV system by having mini-inverters installed as we have 2 trees shading some of the panels during part of the day. Time will tell if this was a good decision!

As a general observation, I am more than miffed, being polite, to be told that our PV system creates a problem rather than solves one...

There we was, in our innocence, dreaming of making a contribution to improving the current health of our planet no less when the Tasmanian government introduced a power feed-back incentive scheme to encourage the locals to go solar, right at the time we were extending our modest abode.

This is the same government who then decided to reduce the buy-back incentive from 28c to 6c/kW. This of course went down like a lead balloon, to the extent that the original decision was reviewed so that, for current beneficiaries, the reduction was stepped from 28c to 13c to 6c over a period of time.

Sorry but I don't get it: one minute there is this attractive offer to install PV systems but now they are creating a problem...go figure!!!

The price of energy is becoming a political football with allowances being distributed to pensioners etc. Sooner or later the crunch will come when true power charges will have to be passed as the cost of such allowances becomes prohibitive.

I'm off me soap box!

Cheers,
Yvan

Yvan

I don't believe you have done the wrong thing for one moment. On the contrary you have made a positive commitment to going down the renewable path. Let me attempt to explain how the whole thing has developed and what have been the pros and cons of the arrangement.

I am not sure when solar started to be commonly adopted, but for arguments sake, we will call it the "early" days. Installation of a domestic or rooftop solar system was expensive and nobody was putting up their hand. There had to be an incentive and various schemes were introduced by the individual states and heavily subsidised both for the installation and the feedback price. This was to kick start the adoption of solar power. Prices offered for feeding back into the grid varied from 44c up to 53c/KWhr. Those states offering 53c/KWhr were fairly quickly subscribed up to their budgeted target. At the time, the large generators such as the power station where I work were getting paid around 8c/Kwhr which puts into perspective just how attractive the scheme was.

Overall these schemes had a finish date and I mention this because the downside of any subsidy is that the price of the goods does not remain down during the currency of the subsidy. It too goes up.

I purchased a 5KW system just before the subsidies were due to cease and paid in round figures $14,000 for which I took out a loan. A year or so earlier I had looked into getting solar and a similar system was going to cost $23,000.I did not do it at that time: Too much even with the subsidy. A colleague at work had put his name down for solar but did not take it up until after the subsidies had ceased. However because he had got his name down he was still entitled to the same scheme as me and with an identical system he paid $11,000, which shows how the subsidy was affecting the market. The subsidy did bolster the demand and reduce the price of panels and inverters, but it was not passed on. The drop in price was $3000 in two weeks.

So we come to solar today and the feedback price reflects the commercial market spot price more or less. There are still some subsidies available for the installation incidentally. We put in a second system the same size and I think the installation was down to $4000!

I am not familiar with the Tasmanian pricing structure and the terms offered, but much will depend on whether it was a firm contract. From what you have said the price is either back to 6c/KWhr or it is ramping back to that price point via 13c/KWhr. Even when you get to 6c just spare a thought for us poor Queenslanders where the spot market for the commercial generators has averaged just below 4½c so far this year! You are actually doing 33% better than we are! Of course if the Tassie government has reneged on a deal, that is an entirely different matter and I will expect to see you at the head of a street parade ranting and raving about the broken promises.

:cool:

I appreciate this may not be exactly what you were hoping to hear, but I hope it may go some way to explaining what has happened particularly with pricing

Just leading on from that, sufficient provision has not been put into place to cope with the final uptake (it may not be final) of solar and that without storage capability it will never be able to provide more than a quarter, actually make that a fifth, of our electricity needs. An additional problem, as I have mentioned elsewhere before, is that solar does not have the ability to control voltage. Eventually a combination of wind and storage technology will resolve the issues, but for the moment the fossil fired stations, including gas because it is not a green source of power, will provide continuity of supply during the sunless and windless hours. We have also got to the point in South Australia where the solar supply can on occasion exceed the demand. Somebody has to stop generating: Problem. Once storage is available it won't be a problem, but that point is not just around the corner so until then, who knows?

Again I will mention that some of the problems of feeding back into the grid are not so much caused by the reverse flow of power, but by a distinct lack of maintenance and antiquated systems that were not pro actively maintained because of greed and profit

There is also some talk of rooftop generators having to pay to use the transmission lines to feed into the grid. This would be a real kick in the erogenous zone as there is already a service charge borne by every customer and will have people jumping up and down big time!

Regards
Paul

[Optimark]

Well, while Bushmiller talks about power plant outputs in the mega's, we are attempting to improve the output of our 20-pannel PV system by having mini-inverters installed as we have 2 trees shading some of the panels during part of the day. Time will tell if this was a good decision!

Cheers,
Yvan

I would suggest it is a good decision, we have two different types of micro inverters, our first lot of 18 panels (4.5kW) are running ABB micro inverters, our second lot of 10 larger panels (3.2kW) have Enphase micro inverters. We also have trees, plus our panels are on four hipped rooftops and one flat rooftop, so micro inverters were really the only solution.

Our neighbours directly opposite us have micro inverters supplied by the South Australian manufacturer of their panels. They have had issues and the issues were so bad all of their micro inverters were replaced.

The difference between our ABB system and our Enphase system is not that great, they both are doing an excellent job, but the Enphase software is the bees knees by comparison to the ABB software.

The people who installed our second lot of solar panels won't install micro inverters unless they are Enphase; virtually no problems with any of their installations once they switched to Enphase micro inverters.

Something for future reference, if you run micro inverters then you have AC coming directly from the roof, which you can use straight away, and if allowed, send excess to the grid. If in the future you wish for a battery or batteries, then in all probability you will have to convert the AC to DC to send to the battery for storage. When you draw from the battery, you will need to convert the DC from the battery to AC for the house. This is what our system does, yes it is slightly wasteful, but it works and works very well.

Mick.

[yvan]

Paul,

Thank you for your explanation taken from another perspective.

As an aside, I am not exactly sure if I understand how the energy market works either: I recall your map showing the spot price of power in the various states of the country. I appreciate the price is a spot price which, by definition, will fluctuate in time but, when I see a negative price, my immediate thought is that the supplier would pay the consumer to consume! Exactly the same as negative interest rates when the depositor pays the bank for the privilege to have the same bank keep his money!!!

Could your figure of 4.5c/kWh indicate that this energy is produced at a loss and, if so, how can it be sustained?

The storage of renewable energy seems to be the key to the management of its use and I would have thought that, instead of building more plants, instrumentalities should consider using the funds to offer owners of PV systems loans at break-even interest rates to install battery banks. No subsidy, sufficiently high interest rates to "cover costs". I would have thought that the cost of a single power plant would buy a fair few battery banks!

Ramblings over!

Cheers,
Yvan

[Chris Parks]

Paul may correct me here but I think there is going to have to be large mass storage in the grid as well as domestic storage. I also think that the grid will be broken up into smaller localised units in some parts such as for country towns.

[BobL]

Something for future reference, if you run micro inverters then you have AC coming directly from the roof, which you can use straight away, and if allowed, send excess to the grid. If in the future you wish for a battery or batteries, then in all probability you will have to convert the AC to DC to send to the battery for storage. When you draw from the battery, you will need to convert the DC from the battery to AC for the house. This is what our system does, yes it is slightly wasteful, but it works and works very well.


We also have an Enphase system.

With conventional PV systems up to 600V DC is running across a roof to the inverter, compared to the the 240V AC coming out of micro inverters. 240V AC which is much safer (eg fires and electrocution), not just the lower V but the fact that it's AC. Even 100V DC is able to kill or serious injure. A colleagues husband was killed by a the DC coming out of just 4 panels. Interesting it didn't kill him directly - it threw him off the roof. :oo:

RE: convert the AC to DC to send to the battery for storage.
Modern inverters are incredibly efficient so the energy loss is less than the efficiency gain from using the micro inverters. VFDs convert a fixed frequency AC to DC back to variable frequency AC for a variety of reasons - the gains in efficiency from driving machinery at variable speeds far outweighs the loss of energy involved in the double conversion process.

[Bushmiller]

Paul,

Thank you for your explanation taken from another perspective.

As an aside, I am not exactly sure if I understand how the energy market works either: I recall your map showing the spot price of power in the various states of the country. I appreciate the price is a spot price which, by definition, will fluctuate in time but, when I see a negative price, my immediate thought is that the supplier would pay the consumer to consume! Exactly the same as negative interest rates when the depositor pays the bank for the privilege to have the same bank keep his money!!!

Could your figure of 4.5c/kWh indicate that this energy is produced at a loss and, if so, how can it be sustained?

The storage of renewable energy seems to be the key to the management of its use and I would have thought that, instead of building more plants, instrumentalities should consider using the funds to offer owners of PV systems loans at break-even interest rates to install battery banks. No subsidy, sufficiently high interest rates to "cover costs". I would have thought that the cost of a single power plant would buy a fair few battery banks!

Ramblings over!

Cheers,
Yvan

Yvan

The price at times was negative and at times very positive. Overall it 4.5c was the average price for the first five months of this year in Qld. It would have been similar, but not the same in each of the other Eastern states. So we are not making a loss, but precious little that could be considered profit.

I think you are right that the government could direct their efforts and money in a much better direction. My personal belief is that the next stage of solar electricity will revolve around storage. I don't see how else, without the introduction of a new technology, that we will be able to approach 100% renewables. I stress "approach" because I can't see us realising this goal completely for the moment: In time I hope I will be able to change my mind on that.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

Paul may correct me here but I think there is going to have to be large mass storage in the grid as well as domestic storage. I also think that the grid will be broken up into smaller localised units in some parts such as for country towns.

Chris

I think you are on the right track, but I have to point out that the "large" batteries proposed are a pittance compared to the demand and way too few. Also battery storage is for the moment uneconomic. To put that into perspective, the much touted Tesla battery produces 100MW for one hour only.

The smallest state demand in Australia, which is our dearly beloved Tassie, is about 1000MW. To supply that state for 24 hours would require 240 batteries of that Tesla size and the solar power to charge them, which is about 4000MW as the solar will only operate for about a quarter of the day at best. This assumes the sun shone through the day. These figures are only a rough guide, but if anything are conservative.

The other states have demand up to eight times that of Tasmania.

That is a lot of batteries. I am still interested to see what happens with that Ambri battery you linked to before.

Regards
Paul

[Bushmiller]

I recall your map showing the spot price of power in the various states of the country. I appreciate the price is a spot price which, by definition, will fluctuate in time but, when I see a negative price, my immediate thought is that the supplier would pay the consumer to consume! Exactly the same as negative interest rates when the depositor pays the bank for the privilege to have the same bank keep his money!!!


Cheers,
Yvan

Yvan

Just to address that concern specifically, the price is totted up over a period of time and the average hopefully is in the black. Should it ever get to a negative overall, we, the generators will be out of business, and more than likely, you and I will be without power. Fortunately that is unlikely to happen so don't rush off to buy your portable gen set yet.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

Recycling an old power station, making good out of bad seems like a worthy idea.

‘All about evolution’: Here’s what to do with a dead power station (https://www.smh.com.au/environment/sustainability/all-about-evolution-here-s-what-to-do-with-a-dead-power-station-20210512-p57r2w.html)

[Bushmiller]

Chris

The hyperbolic shape of cooling towers I always think are architecturally pleasing. I hope the new owners can do something with it, but I have no idea of the acoustics. Often more than 100m high (I think those at Bayswater were 121m) they are very imposing structures with an area approximating a football field at the base. Cheap seating could be available outside the structure with more expensive balcony or boxes higher on the walls. I am imaging the possibilities.....:cool:

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Turn them into Mega-art projects :)

Big picture: How artists including Rone paint enormous silo murals and city art - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-01/silo-art-how-do-artists-like-rone-paint-such-big-murals/100093080)

494495

[woodPixel]

This is the pipeline that was shut down in the USA last week for a few days.... Colonial Pipeline - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_Pipeline)

People there were filling plastic bags and shooting each other at petrol stations over it, like scenes from Mad Max....

Colonial's pipeline carries about 100 million gallons per day of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel.

This is one pipeline by one company in one part of one country.

100 million gallons a DAY.... 378.5 million Litres.....



The world is doomed. We have no hope.

[havabeer69]

like Paul I also work at a power station, ours is coal fired.


the only way we will get proper sized grid "storage" will be with large scale pumped hydro. let the water out during the day when the demand is there and pump it back up at night using cheap electricity.

the problem with ALOT of projects is that the government will not subsidise the grid connection, its why there are so many approved solar farms, hydro dams etc but bugger all actually being built. its because the cost of the getting connected to the grid is insanely high. 900k's of new grid interconnection between S.A and N.S.W is going to cost us (the tax payers and elect users) 2.6 billion. Further blowout for vital NSW-SA grid interconnector (https://www.afr.com/companies/infrastructure/cost-blow-out-for-nsw-sa-grid-connection-20201008-p5636h)

that's 2.8million per kilometre of wires and its not even finished. once you start asking private companies to pay huge connection fee's like that it just becomes unrealistic unless you are very close to the grid. which most of the times all these area's aren't. The government has actually just made some chunk of NSW a green energy zone where I believe they are actually going to contribute funding to help connect some of these renewable projects with in that zone.

Also don't always worry about spot prices TOO much, larger stations will also contract out part of there generating capacity. I'm at a 2 unit coal fired power station and I believe we've basically contracted out 1 units worth of capacity. So we're constantly being paid for that generation. but if the spot market prices go high and we have 1 unit out of service we obviously can't make the bulk of our actual profits, which means maintenance gets cut as we don't have the money to spend.

really the 3 big killers for coal fired power stations will be:
Ash Dam storage - The old addage of "you can't you die" rings true. if you have nowhere to store your ash you can't burn coal
Profitability - Market conditions means you won't make any money so just turn the thing off and walk away, this is both profit from generating or coal becoming to expensive to buy etc.
Plant Failure - Aging plant breaks and becomes to costly to fix


My view of the situation (in NSW) will be:
one or two of the older coal fired stations will close around the 2023 - 2025 mark (about when snowy 2.0 will come in). this will provide a small price increase which will be enough for the remaining stations to stay open until 2029 - 2032 which by then either a new base load gas or stored hydro will be in a much better place to take over.

[Beardy]

Matt put a solar power battery on his bike shop. But there'''s a reason he won'''t put one on his home (https://apple.news/AKKmx3_giQDOOZTlIZewMMQ)

Generally people say they want to go green and save the planet but it appears that it needs to be financially rewarding to do so first

[Chris Parks]

A lot of people with existing solar in NSW may not be aware of a scheme to provide interest free loans in a trial currently available. It seems strange that none of the areas listed are in the south eastern area of the state but we won't go into that. I would be into it like a rat up a drain pipe but we are not in it.

[havabeer69]

assume you're talking about the solar battery offer:
Empowering Homes solar battery loan offer | NSW Government (https://energysaver.nsw.gov.au/households/solar-and-battery-power/empowering-homes-solar-battery-loan-offer)

turns out i'm eligible but really its $900 a year for a battery ($9000 interest free loan) as I already have a 6.6kw solar. so I would need to be saving over $900 a year on electricity to make this viable for my self to meet at least a 10 year pay off.


its also hard with rental property's.... there is zero incentive for me to put panels on my rental property. Doesn't really make the place any more "desirable" in terms of getting tenants in. Other then trying to do my bit to "go green" a lot of existing rental properties will probably never get solar. As it gets mentioned most people don't want to go green unless they benefit from it.

[Chris Parks]

As I mentioned above in a previous post I think that community batteries and micro grids will evolve in the future. I can't see house standalone batteries ever being truly viable like solar panels have become over the last few decades. I did not look at the terms as not being eligible so I will now withdraw my enthusiasm for the idea.

[woodPixel]

Another new battery! Bigger, faster, longer.... Developer Of Aluminum-Ion Battery Claims It Charges 60 Times Faster Than Lithium-Ion, Offering EV Range Breakthrough (https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltaylor/2021/05/13/ev-range-breakthrough-as-new-aluminum-ion-battery-charges-60-times-faster-than-lithium-ion/)

As an aside, everyone keeps thinking of solar on their roof and the "I'm a tenant" argument.

Cool, but I think putting solar on ones roof is NUTS. The tech is moving faster than the market can keep up. Comments #79 and #80 show this. People get disincentivised for a dozen reasons and ALL the benefits go towards the landed aristocratic class ;)

Take that loot and invest it in companies that are making real money out of it. Take the divvies!

There is an ETF that does exactly this.... ASX CLNE (https://www2.asx.com.au/markets/etp/clne) .... there are no doubt a hundred shares that do the same. The ETF gets you into some very interesting companies and most of those are outside of Australia.


Micro grid storage via CAES and battery are a necessity. We need to build build build and then build.... same with trees.

I don't think this world has 20 years left in it before it blows up environmentally.

[Lappa]

Interesting article with comments from the Tomago Smelter CEO in the Daily Telegraph re the need for the smelter to close down at times do to contractual arrangements re spikes due the Sydney winter usage.

”Tomago chief executive Matt Howell said the sudden power price hike to $14,500 a megawatt hour was the equivalent of petrol prices going up to $400 a litre.
When wholesale prices peak, the smelter is contractually obliged to temporarily power down to keep the rest of NSW going.
This isn’t an issue with our contract … it’s about constantly having to (power down) because we can’t afford the price,” Mr Howell said“

[Bushmiller]

Interesting article with comments from the Tomago Smelter CEO in the Daily Telegraph re the need for the smelter to close down at times do to contractual arrangements re spikes due the Sydney winter usage.

”Tomago chief executive Matt Howell said the sudden power price hike to $14,500 a megawatt hour was the equivalent of petrol prices going up to $400 a litre.
When wholesale prices peak, the smelter is contractually obliged to temporarily power down to keep the rest of NSW going.
This isn’t an issue with our contract … it’s about constantly having to (power down) because we can’t afford the price,” Mr Howell said“

Lappa

That is an interesting situation and marks a significant fundamental difference in the way NSW and QLD operate. While NSW has the Tomago smelter, QLD has the Boyne smelter. Both smelter operations are large and of similar size. I think in round figures their potlines consume around 500MW or more (a very broad statement and I don't know precise figures). It is critical that the potlines do not run without power for any significant time. I think it may be 24hours and they would have to get the jackhammers in to chisel out the aluminium product that has solidified.

The fundamental issue is how the two states prioritise the distribution of power and possibly also reflects the availability of surplus power in each state. In NSW, when power is in high demand and supply is short, the industrial users are targeted first. In QLD it is the opposite in that priority is given to industry and the domestic consumers are those to lose power. There are two levels. The first reflects high spot prices while the second level reflects load shedding.

It would appear from the comment that NSW uses the smelter to significantly reduce demand (ie. mitigate high spot prices). Their CEO talks of contractual arrangements. It sounds as if there is a contract in place and I would expect that, but clearly there are other conditions that provide for the operator of the grid (AEMO) to ask them to cut power. There is a little bit of manoeuvring going on by the CEO to my mind. If you are a large consumer you have the ability to negotiate a contract and that contract will insulate you against price spikes. So that is the first comment. The second comment is that he apparently has a contract, but has to reduce load because of the high price. If he has a contract it is not costing him other than loss of production, which admittedly would be a big issue. It sounds as though he has to power down because there is another agreement with the NSW section of the grid that he will have to do this in times of high demand. It may have been a condition of the installation of the smelter in the first place. It would be neccessary to know the background.

One other point is that the price spikes are rarely protracted. Five minutes is normal, but also infrequent. I don't hear him complaining about the times when the price goes negative. It all evens out on the average. Contracts avoid price fluctuations. he is talking about another issue I believe.

Some more info on the smelters:

How Tomago aluminium smelter supports the power grid | Catallaxy Files (https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/20/how-tomago-aluminium-smelter-supports-the-power-grid/)

Boyne Smelters - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boyne_Smelters)

There appears to be a lack of straight talking and there is a decided air of I want my cake and be able to eat it too.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Australia's "father of PV" says your next rooftop solar system might be tens of kilowatts | One Step Off The Grid (https://onestepoffthegrid.com.au/australias-father-of-pv-says-your-next-rooftop-solar-system-might-be-tens-of-kilowatts)

edit - I was thinking... What If....

What If the rollout of solar, wind, hydro, CAES and geothermal DOES race ahead at full bore maximum speed.

Seems the genie is out of the bottle, the toothpaste has left the tube....

This article is just a warm and fuzzy thing of "gee, 2000 is was 1kw, then 210 is 10 and 2020 is 20kw on my roof....".... now what if Solar DOES keep dropping at the rate of 20% per year and EVERY roof is slapped happy with magical 20Kw-producing solar tiles.....

A suburb will generate 1 MW per day... (maybe)

Here in Canberra there are 121 suburbs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburbs_of_Canberra)... and how many houses with roofs? 82,700..... (https://quickstats.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2016/quickstat/CED801)

That's a LOT of juice.

Things are going to blow up!


Now the What If.... IF this occurs, what is the cost to move this juice around? Wires, upgrades, moving from the 16th century electrical grid, etc?

Where is the thinking of What If from our political masters?

Obviously this is a ridiculous hypothetical but it shows that if people are going to be self-interested and they consume their own juice first (even a "little" 10kw jobbie can be acquired for ~$5k (https://www.solarrun.com.au/9-9kw-solar-system-price/)), then the "remaining" costs need to be apportioned/proportioned..... what happens to the 10% of those without solar inputs on their rooves? Do they pay the Big Bills? Hardly.

Interesting line of thought.....

[Bushmiller]

I heard on the radio news that a "significant event" has occurred within the QLD electricity market. Details are sketchy for the moment, but initial information is that nine coal fired units are offline as a result, plus solar is affected too, and currently there is only about half the demand available. This is resulting in considerable load shedding.

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Queensland hit by widespread power outage after fire and explosion at Callide power station - ABC News (https://amp.abc.net.au/article/100164200)

Widespread power outage affecting just under 400k customers in Queensland : australia (https://www.reddit.com/r/australia/comments/nkhp8x/widespread_power_outage_affecting_just_under_400k/)


495051

using this tool --> Australia National Electricity Market Dashboard (https://datastudio.google.com/reporting/1Fah7mn1X9itiFAMIvCFkj_tEYXHdxAll/page/TyK1)

[woodPixel]

A new process and a game changer too...

Scientists develop ‘cheap and easy’ method to extract lithium from seawater - MINING.COM (https://www.mining.com/scientists-develop-cheap-and-easy-method-to-extract-lithium-from-seawater/)

[AlexS]

A new process and a game changer too...

Scientists develop ‘cheap and easy’ method to extract lithium from seawater - MINING.COM (https://www.mining.com/scientists-develop-cheap-and-easy-method-to-extract-lithium-from-seawater/)
Interesting. Nearly 50 years ago I worked in a copper mine where the ore was low grade - <0.5%. One of the geologists reckoned it was approaching the concentration of Cu in seawater, and it wouldn't be too long before they were extracting it from seawater.

[woodPixel]

Interesting. Nearly 50 years ago I worked in a copper mine where the ore was low grade - <0.5%. One of the geologists reckoned it was approaching the concentration of Cu in seawater, and it wouldn't be too long before they were extracting it from seawater.

It seems that every time I read these amazing articles the answer lies in electricity.

Electrification is going to be huge.

Imagine it - if we have gobs and gobs and gobs of spare electricity we can start doing things that are crazy .... mass desal (pump it inland! Irrigation! Industry!), cheap transport, CO2 free smelting, cooling, heating, industry free of the amperage-overhead....

[woodPixel]

Broken Hill compressed-air energy storage facility to inject $457m into economy, company says - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-11/broken-hill-compressed-air-energy-project-economic-impact/100204650)

[havabeer69]

Broken Hill compressed-air energy storage facility to inject $457m into economy, company says - ABC News (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-11/broken-hill-compressed-air-energy-project-economic-impact/100204650)

take that with a grain of salt, its still in the "feasibility" and business case phase, there is even articles about the project from 2019 and 2020 and yet not one shovel has been brought out to start the project.

they couldn't even get funding for a 5MW/10MW/h pilot plant
Storage proponent for huge Broken Hill micro-grid fails to land finance for pilot plant | RenewEconomy (https://reneweconomy.com.au/storage-proponent-for-huge-broken-hill-micro-grid-fails-to-land-finance-for-pilot-plant-62075/)

Hydrostor energy storage project to contribute to New South Wales economy | Energy Global (https://www.energyglobal.com/energy-storage/08062021/hydrostor-energy-storage-project-to-contribute-to-new-south-wales-economy/)

In 2020, Hydrostor’s 200 MW and 8 hours (or 1600 MWh) A-CAES system was selected by NSW’s Transmission Network Service Provider, Transgrid, as the preferred option in its Regulatory Investment Test for Transmission (RIT-T) for reliable and secure supply for Broken Hill. Hydrostor and Energy Estate are actively developing this project, which has received grant funding from the NSW Government’s Emerging Energy Program to complete pre-feasibility work.

[Bushmiller]

Yes.

We have to differentiate between those projects that have an incontrovertible go-ahead and those that are being touted to see if there are any takers. The proposal for a new power station at the old Collinsville site was a classic example of something that had no foundation.

Regards
Paul

[Lappa]

:rolleyes:And it’s amazing that all these new technologies require electricity to work

[woodPixel]

:rolleyes:And it’s amazing that all these new technologies require electricity to work

I am amazed, from that article, that they couldn't raise 60 mil. Such a trivial sum.


The whole point is electrification. Everyone wails about "what when the sun dont shine" .... well, tra-da! Batteries and CAES.

Fossil fuels and CO2 generation must stop.


I think the problem is these developers are still thinking too small. $60M is just background noise. Pump it up to a billion and then you'll get a few Liberal pollies involved :;

[havabeer69]

I am amazed, from that article, that they couldn't raise 60 mil. Such a trivial sum.


The whole point is electrification. Everyone wails about "what when the sun dont shine" .... well, tra-da! Batteries and CAES.

Fossil fuels and CO2 generation must stop.


I think the problem is these developers are still thinking too small. $60M is just background noise. Pump it up to a billion and then you'll get a few Liberal pollies involved :;

a problem is at the moment we're asking private companies to front up the cost and unless they can see a $$$ return they won't invest.

so unless the government chucks the money in a lot of projects just wont happen and its actually pretty hard/slow just to get grant money out of the government. It's also not just the building costs its all the on going costs as well and the government are just too focused on trying to get the budget back into the black then what's actually good for all its citizens.

[Bushmiller]

a problem is at the moment we're asking private companies to front up the cost and unless they can see a $$$ return they won't invest.



haveabeer

That is absolutely the crux of the matter. Add to that the equivocal stance by the government and the prospect of investment becomes slight tending towards "you must be joking.". Until such time as the government of the day acknowledges there is a climate crisis and actively demonstrates that this is it's firm belief by their actions, as opposed to lip service, private companies will be reluctant to commit their funds

How will the government persuade private enterprise they are serious about climate change? I would say they have a problem in this regard considering their past history of constant denial. I would suggest they would need to have a vested interest such as would come about by joint ventures even if they are a minority partner.

Before my comments are seen as political I would like readers to view this satirical take on the Victorian situation (Labour party of course) where there is a proposal to begin taxing electric vehicles. Watch the delicious ladies from The Juice Media and see the comparison with Norway in particular.

Honest Government Ad | Electric Vehicles - The Juice Media (https://www.thejuicemedia.com/honest-government-ad-electric-vehicles/)

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

The idea for taxing BEV's came from the US and Australia would just be copy cats if it happens here which it must do eventually. The difference between the US and here is that in the US there are tax credits and incentives to buy a BEV and here the government is trying to avoid upsetting its electoral base (presumably) by not encouraging anything that can be seen to be hurting the coal industry. This is a good link to the US situation 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)

[Bushmiller]

Chris

Thanks for that link. My take is that there are two aspects. Firstly the initial incentives to go EV, which are just not there compared to other countries: Norway is the prime example

495943

and secondly the question of taxation down the track. It would seem that Victoria is putting the cart before the horse. Also see where the US is related to other western nations:

495944

Having said that, our past record of sleeping with the US would leave me to believe your conjecture is right.

Regards
Paul

[Chris Parks]

Norway is actively going down the path of alternative energy in spite of what it will do to their huge oil production that supports those goals of reduced emissions while Australia refuses to do exactly the same thing because the politicians are petrified of what will happen to them at the next elections. I thought the politicians were elected to do the best thing for Australia and not for themselves. I doubt one party is any better than any others in Australia but time will tell on that one.

[Lappa]

One argument I see the Govt using is they have spent close on a trillion dollars getting Australia through the pandemic so they will need time to pay down that debt before they can provide relief in other areas such as electric car incentives.