Yup, it's a 2009, and has already required a new thermostat in around 2014...
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It looks as though the curtain has finally come down on nukes for Oz:
Political battle over nuclear power moves to the states (thenewdaily.com.au)
A former energy minister in the NSW government was just one dissenter:
"Liberal dissent
Matt Kean, a former energy minister and treasurer in Dominic Perrottet’s NSW government, has resigned from a Liberal and National Party member-run renewable energy advocacy group because it supported nuclear energy over wind and solar.
“The reality is there is no feasible pathway [for nuclear energy] to play any material role in helping Australia replace our coal-fired power stations in line with the climate science,” Kean said."
and this in particular:
[I]“Large-scale nuclear reactors have proven costly and slow to deliver and would refer you to the UK experience with the Hinkley Point C power station, and the fact that small modular nuclear reactors are not currently commercial anywhere in the world.”
Of course this has been known for some time, but those with an agenda were attempting to give it life like Frankenstein's monster. It remains to be seen how one prominent Liberal stalwart will save face or even accept this decision.
Regards
Paul
this is a few days old for a reply bush miller
but just remember origin energy mainly deal with gas supply, Imagine what might happen if you take 2800MW out of the grid from coal. It's almost like the Gas plants may need to run harder to cover the gap in the production. I wonder what might happen to gas prices if there was a sudden demand for it...
most of the people you talk to at Eraring are basically saying the company is just holding out to get a big cash grab from the government to stay open.
Whether the pro-nuclear lobby will let the facts get in the way remains to be seen.
I read recently that Bill Gates is getting into liquid sodium reactor nuclear power. Apparently he started his fund raising (via a company know as TerraPower) back in 2008 and the first reactor will be up and running by 2030 (hah hah). Given the way bill's foundation has managed to botch pretty well everything they touch (human health, agriculture, media, science etc) I don't rate the chances that this will get anywhere significant. It also needs to be born in mind that this is taking place in a country that already has a nuclear energy regulatory system and industry, and we have none of this
HAB
No need to apologise for late replies. Life has to go on and the Forum is probably way down the list of priorities for most.
Yes, Origin's other interests are a good point and I can see that the demand for gas could rise dramatically without Erarings contribution. This would inevitably mean that electricity prices would rise too. Possibly this is the scenario Origin is putting to the government (State gov I am assuming in the first instance, although it could become federal too). Unfortunately, maintenance of aging stations becomes expensive as maintenance morphs into replacement and Eraring's owners have a very good case for their proposal to shut it down. The galling aspect is how cheaply they were "gifted" the station in the first place and their attitude today.
It rather sounds as if either way Origin comes out with a win.
Just as a small aside our Unit 1 at Millmerran was taken offline yesterday for a major, planned outage. One of the jobs is to replace some attemperators. These pieces of equipment are called "superheater de-superheaters" in the NSW systems and are a method of controlling the steam temperatures at different points in the steam flow path (information for the non-power station readers). Ours are situated on the top level of the boiler. The largest of them weights about 8.5T. The only way they can be moved into place is by crane and removal of a section of the roof. This was done a few days ago in readiness for the "shut."
A crane was hired for this purpose: A big bastad. 350T, which is for the reach required more than the weight. Some pix:
This is without the top boom raised:
Attachment 537051Attachment 537052Attachment 537054
The top boom extension has it's own trailer to assist mobility. Aside from the mobile crane itself, I was told the components came on five separate trailers.
Attachment 537060
The attemperator being lifted by a 20T Franna.. quite easily.
Attachment 537055
Some idea of the reach required:
Attachment 537056Attachment 537057 Attachment 537059
All this comes at quite a price even though the crane was only there for three days. If it had been too windy or even wet, it might have been four or five days! Just showing this to provide some pictorial relief and to demonstrate the sort of costs that can be encountered as time goes on. We, at Millmerran, are only twenty two years old!
Regards
Paul
Now I am not really advocating that the "Mini Grid" is any sort of solution to Australia's electrical future, but it does highlight the variety of options out there:
What are mini-grids, and why are they important? (msn.com)
Having said that I believe there are a number of new housing developments and other locations that have been set up to be self-sufficient as far as electricity needs are concerned.
People power: everyday Australians are building their own renewables projects, and you can too (theconversation.com)
Regards
Paul
Not sure if mini grids differ from Micro Grids but there are at least 4 micro grids operating in WA and a bunch more in the pipeline.
Recently a couple of new micro grids in Nullagine and Carnarvon using 100/400kWh ZnBr flow and 250/1450 kWh NaS long term batteries have been announced.
See
https://arena.gov.au/assets/2024/03/...d_25032024.pdf
That doesn't necessarily mean that 5 year old data has changed much, if any. We know that it's still extremely expensive to set up, with a very long lead time, and with eye-watering de-commissioning costs to be passed on to 2 to 3 generations down the track.
I still think that whether or not it can be made viable will be a moot point because renewables, and storage in particular, will have matured well before nuclear would be ready, and probably before the argument has finished (because it WILL be a very long argument).
I don’t believe the average time of 6 to 8 years to build a large scale nuclear reactor is all that long when you look at Snowy 2 and the estimated time to wire the grid from the renewables and have enough renewables in place to replace current coal or gas fired generators.
In regards to the CSIRO - they should be advising the Govt with reliable and up-to- date information.
Currently it appears the Govt is sdvising the CSIRO.
Here’s an interesting opinion
More misinformation from CSIRO on Nuclear - YouTube
There are, to my mind, two big advantages of nuclear power. Firstly, in this modern era, it is not an emitter of CO2. Secondly, the fuel itself is relatively cheap, primarily because it does not use much fuel in terms of volume.
However, neither of these advantages come into play without a huge amount of initial expense as the setup costs and regulation, which in this country would still have to be established (another minefield), are mindboggling.
As to contamination, admittedly there is not much in the way of CO2, but there will be an abundance of radiated material that cannot just be exploded or otherwise recycled when the use by date is up and the plant is de-commissioned.
In a practical context we have to ask ourselves if nuclear can compete with renewables during the day on the one hand and through the night on the other. Right now, nothing competes with renewables during the day. The coal fired stations back off to their minimum practical loads and pay to stay online. The gas units (years ago we used to call them "wizzers") stop completely, hence their peaking capabilities. The nukes would be in the same position as the coal fired units. So, although the nuke's fuel costs are relatively low, the owners or investors are hugely in debt to the financiers (banks and others). This is a debt that is likely to be in place for at least two thirds of the station's life, if not longer. The question now is whether a nuke could make enough money through the night to make up for the loss through the day.
Unlikely.
Furthermore, this means that any prospective investor would be looking at the situation in Australia as to whether they could make money, bearing in mind that the cost of setting up a nuke is around twice, or maybe more, than a fossil fired station. The answer: Nah!
End of story. Look for another solution to the nighttime supply problem and find it sooner rather than later. Wake up Australia.
Regards
Paul
Paul I think this pretty well sums it up.
The only way they can make it pay is by subsidies and then we are back to paying more than we should.
The other thing to look at is time.
Just look at how long Snowy 2 is taking - unless Chinese style dictatorial regulations are implemented Nuclear will take significantly longer to set up.
In the meantime night time renewables like wind, and all forms of storage will become even cheaper- so even more subsidies will be needed for boat anchor supplies like nuclear.
I don't really understand why this is the case. I realise that during the day there is an abundance of energy, but the concept of having to pay to stay online seems like an artificial construct - how is it that the solar power is still being sold when other forms have to pay? Or are all the energy providers, including renewables, paying to supply power at these times?
What is the cost of running all new grid lines to the solar and wind farms vs. building nukes at existing power station sites with the grid already in place?
Paul, if I may, can I rephrase what you have said and then pose a couple of questions?
First the cost accounting:
- Nothing competes with solar during the day, and
- Only solar competes with wind when the wind is blowing.
- Both renewables have variable output - overcast days and high/low wind periods.
Thus when the renewable gods are aligned we have very cheap power, interspersed with periods of zero power.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bushmiller
I think the alternative question is whether nuclear can be ramped up quickly to fill those intermittent supply breaks.
This implies that the concept of base load supply is now superceded. Renewables will supply cheap power but there will be regular and irregular periods when it does not supply. The role of "manufactured electricity" will be to fill those voids.
At present, only hydro and gas fired plants can fill this need. But one cannot be expanded much because we are running out of suitable rivers and the other has pollution issues. Batteries are still a pipe dream.
In the future, will we have a world where peak renewables generate 200% of power needs and the excess is used to pump hydro or make hydrogen to power the gaps?
I'll let Paul supply a detailed answer but my take is as follows
Solar can nominally be switched off immediately so they're only paying in the sense that they are not getting paid but they are not shelling out $$.
Thermal coal can do this so there's serious amount of ongoing operating cost and energy balancing needed in short medium and even longer term so they are always shelling our $$
I know there's a bit more to it that this but I'll let Paul do that..
a) People who live where current coal power stations are currently located are unlikely to stand for nuclear plants being located there so will need to be located remotely so there's just as much cost involved in running lines to remote locations. Old power sites make good places for storage to be located
b) the existing power line infrastructure is so badly degraded it needs replacing/upgrading anyway so why not do it to where there is power generated
c) Energy distribution futures should seriously consider interconnected solar/storgae micro/mini grids - especially for regional situations. This improves reliability and reduces the cost of interconnection. This is increasingly happening in WA. In remote and regional in WA it's proving cheaper in the long run to install a bank of solar collectors and storage than upgrade and maintain expensive interconnects.
Thanks Graeme and Bob.
You are both on the money (sorry. poor phraseology ) with your comments, but as we know, life is just not simple or easy.
Perhaps I can expand a little further and try to answer Warb's questions. Let's take a hypothetical thermal fired power station of, say, 500MW. It will have a ramp rate of something between 3MW/min and 5MW/min under normal circumstances. Hypothetically let's suppose we are generating at maximum load at 0600hrs and then the sun rises and solar power leaps into action. The price goes from $150/MWhr down to $50/MWhr and then within the next hour it goes to $20 and within another hour it is at -$-20 (negative money). The unit starts to deload at the $50 price point because the operators and their traders can see what is about to happen. At 5MW/min it would take 100 minutes and at 3MW/min it would take close to three hours to reach zero. It is only viable to generate when the spot market price is above the cost of the fuel. The cost of fuel varies hugely dependent on the geographical location. There was a time when power stations were located in the middle of cities such as Pyrmont and Bunnerong in Sydney and Tennyson in Brisbane, but that soon changed to placing them as close to the coal source as possible and moving them away from densly populated areas. I would hazzard a guess (and this is a really wide one) that coal could be in the range of $50/tonne to $90/tonne
Efficiencies vary, but assume that it takes 500Kg of coal to generate 1MW/hr. For power plants their minimum price will now range between $25 and $45. This is not the point at which they make money, but the point at which they lose less. It minimises the losses of your fixed costs which are still present even if you sit there not generating. Whilever the money coming in is more than the cost of fuel, you minimise the losses until such time as you make a profit.
This scenario assumes that zero is a minimum load. It is not, unless you are planning to come off line. A unit of this size may be relatively unstable at those lower loads or there may be other constraints that limit how low it is "reasonably" possible to go. On the way down this unit incurred several costs. We had six mills in service with each one nominally capable of 100MW. However, they each have a minimum throughput and before that is reached they have to have oil support for stability. The oil guns (it is typically diesel similar to that used in road going vehicles) is costly. For the purposes of this exercise we are going to come down in load to 150MW. At that load we are only going to have two mills left in service. The other four mills came out of service as load was reduced and cost $5000 for each mill ($20,000 so far).
As we approach our target of 150MW, the price drops further to -$40. What do we do? If we come to zero we go offline. Now, it is possible to disconnect from the grid and keep the boiler ticking over by using the Bypass, but not all units have a Bypass. The Bypass takes the steam generated by the boiler and dumps it straight back into the condenser via the HP and LP bypasses. The steam is just going round in a circle generating nothing but costing quite a bit. Additionally, it may still take a couple of hours to come back on line when the price looks as though it is going in the right direction.
In our scenario, we also have some contracts to fulfill so we probably do need to keep the unit at some load as the spot market is only part of the mix. Suppose we have 200MW of contracts. We may be able to come to 150MW and buy 50MW from the market at -$40 and supply under our contract price which was $70! That turns things around a little.
A small phenomenon occurs at -$40. The solar shuts down! Why did it not shut down immediately $zero ticked over? After all, they only have to flick a switch. The answer is there is a guaranteed price: But only for the moment. Without knowing exactly what it is, it seems that $40 or just under is likely as -$40 is when solar switches off.
Back to the scenario and around 1800hrs, the market price starts to pick up as the sun disappears and people arrive home, start their evening meal and, increasingly, charge up their EV. As we come back up in load we have to put the mills back into service. This operation is not quite as expensive as taking them out (we don't have to grind out the mills to clear them), but still costs as again we burn oil to support the combustion.
I hasten to add that I know of no unit like the one I have described above and it is a mix of places I have been (Millmerran is my fourth station). I could describe the constraints of the Millmerran units but that would definitely be divulging confidential information, which is why I have done a Geoffrey Robertson Hypothetical. Also, the above de-load and load assumes everything went smoothly. It certainly does not always happen that way. It would be great if we could just take the foot off the accelerator, but it is not like that. If it was we would run the stations from an app on our phone and I would not have a job.
So Warb, the above is the long answer. The short answer is that the cost of coming offline, coming back online and the lack of security is more than the cost of paying to stay online. Remember that the spot market is only part of the market. I don't know what proportion is under contract. It could be as much as three quarters. I just don't know. You may recall that when prices went ballistic, opportunistic players in the retail section got caught out badly as they had no contracts in place and were having to buy wholesale at more than they were charging retail.
Having said all that, there will come a point when the cost of staying online is too much to bear and the fossil stations will become fossils themselves. This is the crux of the discussion regarding proposed station closures, which frequently coincide with the reasonable life expectancy of those same stations. Most of the NSW and Victorian units are between forty and fifty years old compared to the six QLD units that are a mere twenty to twenty five years old, although there are older units too.
I hope this may put things into perspective, but looking back on what I have written, I can see that I may have created more questions than answers.
Please feel free to ask and perhaps others can weigh in too where they have industry knowledge. I am not precious about this.
Regards
Paul
An interesting discussion on the fossil fuel industry and PR:
How to spot five of the fossil fuel industry’s biggest disinformation tactics (msn.com)
Regards
Paul
Centre for Independent Studies - Wikipedia
"Independent". Hmmm...
But why does the price go negative? Oversupply reduces the price, but in no other market that I can think of does the price go negative. The answer, I suspect, is twofold. Firstly, unlike any other market, the producers cannot stockpile their excess power - they must, as you say, shut down the system and stop producing power. This opens them up to a "blackmail" pricing system, wherein the buyers know full well that they have no choice but to pay. The second part of the problem is explained in the following statement:
A guaranteed price for renewables, put in place in order to make them a better investment, means that they get preferential treatment when it comes to selling their power. What is more interesting is that the guarantee must go deeper than simply the price, it must also guarantee the sale. If the price alone was guaranteed, the buyer would simply buy from other suppliers when the market price dropped too low. The fact that they don't would indicate that they are mandated to buy whatever the renewables can produce in preference to buying from fossil fuel sources. This is what I meant when I said the negative pricing was the result of an artificial construct.
It's an interesting situation. Having a system driven by profit alone means that renewables have to be artificially made into a profitable system. It's not that they're not inherently profitable, it's just that to increase their rate of construction "we" have had to make then even more profitable (and, let's be honest, if "they" can extort a few more $ from the government to get paid more to do what they were going to do anyway, then why wouldn't they?). The result, of course, is that coal fired generators get hit with the artificial negative pricing during the day. But that is, of course, not all bad news. Coal fired generators know full well that their race is run, but at this stage they are still needed overnight and in times of unfavourable conditions. They can leverage the negative pricing to force yet more "tax dollars" to be spent on subsidies for their plants, to keep them going for a few more years until the renewables are able to take over full time. Perhaps they can also factor in some losses in order to declare bankruptcy before they have to pay to dismantle their old fossil fuel plants? I'm sure they have it all planned out!
There is no such thing as an independent anything anymore (if there ever was!). All reporting, all research, and everything else is driven by some person or group with an axe to grind. It takes a very brave (and financially suicidal) person to come to a conclusion that is at odds with that of their major sponsor!
I seriously doubt there ever was. I'm reading a book about the strange philosopher Nietzsche. He proposed somewhere in 1880 that just about every conversation/dialog/reporting/book etc has unknowingly or otherwise at its basis "power", or more specifically trying to gain power over other people. He would undoubtedly include stuff on the internet (ie this post as well) :D
Warb
Your precis pretty much nails the situation.
The only additional comments I would make is that human nature being what it is, a company is going to make the best of any opportunity it sees even if that was not the original intention of the framework. Look at the job keeper travesties during Covid for companies that profited outside of the intended scope.
The negative pricing, actually it starts a long way before the money goes negative for most generators, is the first line in frequency control. To explain that we have to remember, as you have pointed out, that in the main electricity is not stored. An oversupply, if allowed to continue, would increase the frequency beyond 50Hz. The philosophy is "we are not paying you so you might as well de-load." Of course there are other methods of reducing load too, of which the main one is PFC (primary frequency control) whereby a generators output can be decreased or increased by up to 18MW almost instantaneously. Today, this is pre-requisite for a thermal station to be in the market. I may have mentioned before that the renewables generally do not have this feature, but in the future they will have to have that.
The result of this is that solar and wind generate as much as they can, subject to sun and wind conditions, until the spot price dips negatively below their guaranteed price. Then they pull the plug. It is a luxury not enjoyed by the thermal stations.
The guaranteed price for renewables was necessary to kick the process away. I don't know at what point those guarantees will be phased out. It is not a level playing field at the moment. I would assume that subsidies in the future will be more for storage than generation as that will be the only way batteries or indeed any other method of storage will develop sufficiently.
I can see a time in the future where thermal stations will seek assistence to remain operating as in earlier periods they would be shutting down, being at the end of their life span and too expensive to keep maintaining and repairing. For example, perhaps Eraring is close to that point as it approaches 45 years old for the first of the four units there.
Regards
Paul
Bob
It looks like we are stuck with bias as an integral part of communication as the alternative is never to talk or write about anything whatsoever!
:)
I have in the past on this thread mentioned bias and agendas in the context of where a view comes from. It is time for me to reiterate my own prejudice (for newcomers to the thread) and that I work in a coal fired power station, although my bias is now arguably less than what it once was, seeing as how I job share with a colleague. I am literally semi-retired, working exactly half the hours.
:wink:
Regards
Paul
Hi All
I haven't followed read though this thread much only the last though posts. As for coal fired power station well cannot say I involved much but design/ or more exactly redesigned some aspects of a coal fired power station back in the day when such things where built. And one of my close friends was pretty senior in snowy scheme, well senior for a local, as the place is built by Italians.
None of this experience makes me an expert in the grid by any means.
As for the future of the grid, I do some suspect that path is written. The bigger Chinese battery suppliers are starting/expecting to supply batteries to MF at manufactures at 0.3 RMB watt/hour. These would be lithium phosphate style. Assuming say 5000 cycle at 80% DOD and the support electronics are recycled the cost of these without margins (don't stress me with details of this, pointing only to underlying costs if delivery, by some miracle, was efficient) of these units is approx $5 megawatt hour. So given this there is plenty of room a couple of fat margins from greedy corporations, particularly if they get the chance to recharge for negative dollars.
Assuming batteries to reach the projected price level the increase in battery installations will possibly to an oversupply position with some interesting effects on competing technologies.
If you don't believe me that fine, but the dynamics that cause the RMB 0.3 watt/hour LFP batteries are the same dynamics that cause the lithium carbonate to dive in price, embryonic but developing market - unstable dynamics.
This will be slow moving adaption, there is alot of red tape in electrical market and the supply of solar power far too small to dominate all thermal power, as yet, but the drivers /possibilities are identifiable
No, FPV is not a hot Ford. It is about Floating Photo Voltaic panels. Matt Ferrell goes into the pros and cons :
1010413 (youtube.com)
Regards
Paul
Just going back to the Jervis Bay NPP thought bubble for a moment: yer wouldn't believe it, but I've just been made aware that the father of one of my old school mates was the Chief Engineer (not Physicist) for that site. This came up in a Facebook post he put up a day or two ago. He has some interesting observations to make about nuclear power. I made the comment that his Dad inadvertently made the world's most indestructible car park, which is probably at least ten times thicker than required.
In terms of influencing of outcomes by sponsors it depends what sort of research and who's funding it.
When I did research on natural nuclear reactors in the 1980's funded by the Uni and the ARC (Australian Research Council) there was zero influence to "toe any sort of prescribed line" and I was able to publish whatever conclusions I deemed appropriate.
From 1988 to 1990 my USA boss was funded by NASA so that I could to undertake research on the isotope patterns of Mg, Ca, Ti, Cr, Ni, Fe and Zn in small grains found in meteorites that predated the formation of the solar system. The results had implications in the formation of these elements during early stage supernovae events. NASA didn't give two hoots what the results were. Over the years my USA boss obtained millions of $$ from NASA again with no assumptions on what the results were. Apart from something like SETI which can have religious implications, most astronomical and fundamental particle research is usually untethered.
During my 30 odd years in research I never felt under any pressure to meet the expectations of the Funding agencies that supported my research. There still are lots of other "forces" involved like the desire to "being first", or scientists looking for support for pre-existing positions etc but these are rarely forces pushed by fundamental science funding agencies.
Even today the ARC does not apply this sort of pressure in the fundamental research space. They do exert subtle pressure by favouring funding towards more of some kinds research that others but what is done with results is up to the researcher and I have yet to hear of anyone that lost out on subsequent ARC finding because they came out with a certain result.
For many years I was on an International Science Panel to "vet" research related to the claimed discoveries of new elements (atomic numbers 111 - 118) which was extremely interesting. This type of research has a major "to be the first" force component because this then dictates "the right to propose new element names". This turned out to be as much of an exercise in international relations as science. But just like the Russians at the space station all decisions were arrived at quite amicably and as fairly as possible.
I'm not saying bias doesn't happen and I know of a some very interesting cases but it a bit of a stretch to say that it applies to all research.
Of course not all research is impacted, but my take on it is that the possibility of a bias being injected into the result is in direct proportion to how much money someone stands to make from a favourable outcome.
I was giving an intelligence briefing to Prime Minister and Cabinet once when the Prime Minister asked a very pertinent question to which I could have taken hours to respond, or give him the short answer. "In short, Prime Minister, the answer is 'money'. The answer is always 'money'. If you ever think the answer isn't 'money', you didn't really understand the question." My bosses were trying to crawl away out of sight thinking I had overstepped my mark and were obviously trying to disassociate themselves from me, until the Prime Minister told me that was possibly the best answer he ever got to a question. Always follow the money trail.
I have no doubt that there is indeed esoteric research that has few external influences, though I'd be tempted to suggest that even that is changing - it is no doubt far easier to get sponsorship or publicity for research (or most other things) if you link it, for example, to climate change.
Your statement is entirely correct. Esoteric research solely for the sake of knowledge is likely to be relatively unbiased, as long as nobody stands to gain or lose money, standing, reputation or anything else!
Since the concept that "you can't argue with the science" has been forced upon us, the ability of scientists to profit by declaring the desired results has increased greatly. This also means that the temptation to declare such results has also increased!
[QUOTE=MartinCH;2332467Assuming batteries to reach the projected price level the increase in battery installations will possibly to an oversupply position with some interesting effects on competing technologies. [/QUOTE]
Interesting analysis and supposition, Martin.
The price of lithium batteries has dropped by over 80% in real terms over the past ten years.
https://assets.bbhub.io/professional...ry-300x169.png
And the price of lithium metal has returned to its "normal range" after spiking in 2022-2023 (Chinese prices).
Source: Trading Economicshttps://carboncredits.b-cdn.net/wp-c...-Economics.png
Who knows how well focused is your crystal ball?