Electric, Hybrid or Just Wait

[Spyro]

I would very much like to tell you that won't happen, but to some extent it will. Gradually those practices will cease too. What we can say if that this is not commenced at some point in time it will certainly not happen. PV solar panels are in fact a good example of this. back in the 70s before funding to the CSIRO was progressively reduced, Australia was a leading source of solar development. There was no funding, diminished research and as a consequence we lost that competitive edge. If solar subsidies had not been implemented, that form of renewable would be much less prominent in Australia than it is.

Ι don't know Paul, it's my luck I think, I keep getting involved in those industries and the more I learn the more cynical I get.
Just happened to work for a solar park company last year with multiple $100m+ projects around AU, and they lost a tonne of money on all of them, and everywhere I looked I found they were not the only ones. From talking to the experts it became clear that the main problem was in the commissioning stage ie connecting the thing to the grid, because the grid in AU is so old and fragile that it took months and then years of testing, trials, audits and modifications just to make sure they don't blow it up when connecting the park to it. At some point I thought it's just a bad industry with no future, at least in this country, but I see more companies like that keep coming, and trying, and losing money, even with the cheapest possible PV panels they're using. See how long it lasts.

The problem with all those new technologies, electric cars, plastic recycling, battery recycling, solar panels, is that they're really not new at all, they've all been around for decades. And if they haven't found a way by now to make them profitable they will simply not take off. Mobile phones took off basically because humanity agreed to quadruple their phone bill from what they were paying for telecommunications in the 90's. But for energy, recycling and transportation people don't want to pay more. Because lets face it, most of us and our companies say that we care about all that green stuff, but we really don't. If we did, we'd pay.

[Beardy]

Ι don't know Paul, it's my luck I think, I keep getting involved in those industries and the more I learn the more cynical I get.
Just happened to work for a solar park company last year with multiple $100m+ projects around AU, and they lost a tonne of money on all of them, and everywhere I looked I found they were not the only ones. From talking to the experts it became clear that the problem was in the commissioning stage ie connecting the thing to the grid, because the grid in AU so old and fragile that it took months and then years of testing and trials and modifications just to make sure they don't blow it up when connecting the park to it. At some point I thought it's just a bad industry with no future, at least in this country, but I see more companies like that keep coming, and trying, and losing money, even with the cheapest possible PV panels they're using. See how long it lasts.

The problem with all those new technologies, electric cars, plastic recycling, battery recycling, solar panels, is that they're really not new at all, they've all been around for decades. And if they haven't found a way by now to make them profitable they will simply not take off. Mobile phones took off basically because humanity agreed to quadruple their phone bill from what they were paying for telecommunications in the 90's. But for energy, recycling and transportation people don't want to pay a dollar more. Because lets face it, most of us and our companies say that we care about all that green stuff, but we really don't. If we did, we'd pay.

I would of thought the main issue was that the technology is not there to service our peak requirements which are normally the times that solar is not producing energy so they are trying to sell a product at a time when the demand is not there for buying.

If it worked and made coal fired stations redundant I think the public would get on board but we aren’t there yet are we?

[BobL]

It sounds like you missed the bus, eg solar panels have taken off big time.
Screen Shot 2021-03-07 at 7.45.28 am.png


I detest the fact that energy generation and supply has for years been rabidly held onto by large entities (ie government, multinationals and large businesses) using dubious practices . The decentralisation of a commodity like energy can only be good thing.

Anyway I can't seen how blaming grid failure is the reason we should't be using renewables. Due to increased energy demand the grid would be failing whether we use renewables or not. If anything the renewables are spurring the renewal of the grid as it is sorely needed. yes we have to find a way to pay for it. My electrical provider charges me 28 c/kWhr to draw from the grid and only 7c/kWhr to supply. If they can't make a go of that to fund a decent grid then they need another job.

[Spyro]

I would of thought the main issue was that the technology is not there to service our peak requirements which are normally the times that solar is not producing energy so they are trying to sell a product at a time when the demand is not there for buying.

If it worked and made coal fired stations redundant I think the public would get on board but we aren’t there yet are we?

I think this is more relevant to the household PVs, solar parks by definition have to send nearly all their output to the grid anyway. We're nowhere close to replacing coal fired stations, the $100m+ projects I was talking about are only good for powering a small town or large village. But I'm not an engineer, I'm in finance, so maybe I'm not explaining it properly, but I could see there were typically some budget overruns in transportation, labour and subcontractors (all understandable because those projects are always out in the bush and it costs a lot to get all the hardware and the specialised personnel over there), but the main overruns were always in commissioning, you could tell they never thought it would take so much time and effort to plug the damn thing in. The hardware and technology was hardly ever the problem, at least budget wise.

[Spyro]

Anyway I can't seen how blaming grid failure is the reason we should't be using renewables.

Not saying we shouldn't, I'm saying we should make a brave decision and pay no matter what. Instead of waiting for the technology to catch up.
But when I say pay I mean include the recycling of batteries as well, there's lots of nasties in those things and the current recycling situation is a bit shady at best.

[Bushmiller]

Ι don't know Paul, it's my luck I think, I keep getting involved in those industries and the more I learn the more cynical I get.
Just happened to work for a solar park company last year with multiple $100m+ projects around AU, and they lost a tonne of money on all of them, and everywhere I looked I found they were not the only ones. From talking to the experts it became clear that the main problem was in the commissioning stage ie connecting the thing to the grid, because the grid in AU is so old and fragile that it took months and then years of testing, trials, audits and modifications just to make sure they don't blow it up when connecting the park to it. At some point I thought it's just a bad industry with no future, at least in this country, but I see more companies like that keep coming, and trying, and losing money, even with the cheapest possible PV panels they're using. See how long it lasts.

The problem with all those new technologies, electric cars, plastic recycling, battery recycling, solar panels, is that they're really not new at all, they've all been around for decades. And if they haven't found a way by now to make them profitable they will simply not take off. Mobile phones took off basically because humanity agreed to quadruple their phone bill from what they were paying for telecommunications in the 90's. But for energy, recycling and transportation people don't want to pay more. Because lets face it, most of us and our companies say that we care about all that green stuff, but we really don't. If we did, we'd pay.

Spyro

I have mentioned many times on this Forum and bored friends and relatives to tears pointing out that, thanks to a number of governments progressively privatising the industry, the market is now a competitive one that is driven fundamentally by the bottom line. I also need to point out that I do not agree with this state of affairs, but it is now what we have and I believe it is irreversible. Even if they wanted to, and they don't, the respective state governments do not have the money to buy back.

So let us step on to the exponential rise in the solar installations. That was relatively easy as far as domestic solar was concerned because the infrastructure was already there, although arguably antiquated and in need of upgrades. Electricity can flow either way: No problem. The increased demand has led to huge production savings to the point where the cost of panels is probably approaching one tenth of what it was only two or three years ago. In that regard the initial subsidies did their intended job and kick started the process.

The problems have arisen more to do with the commercial companies. They saw an opportunity and grabbed it. Installed large arrays and then got all bitter and twisted when there were no lines to connect to the grid. Sorry. If you build out in the middle of nowhere, you will need to provide the transmission lines. What part of a commercial operation do you not understand?

Now at this point I have to declare my involvement in the industry in that I am employed at the second last coal fired power station built in Australia ( commissioned in 2003). When our station was built, in addition to the basic infrastructure (boiler, turbine, generator and associated ancillary plant) we had had to construct power lines, a substation, a road bypass around the town and a pipeline supplying treated effluent from Toowoomba, which is nearly 100Km away.

When the station was conceived, back in the early 90s, it was identified that the trigger for a new station was when the wholesale price reached $35/MWhr. At the moment the average price thirty years later is less than $45/MWhr, which equates to 4.5c/KWhr (so BobL is not doing too badly at 7c/KWhr ). However I am comparing Queensland to WA so that is not altogether valid, but it will be similar. However, I can't see that too many more solar companies will be contemplating large installations for the moment: The reason being that during the day the spot price often falls to zero. This makes it extremely difficult for any company to recoup their outlay and begin to make a profit. A solar company only has the day to make money. Of course not all power is sold on the spot market and contracts are made involving fixed prices. The dynamic has changed markedly for the thermal generators and indeed everybody and during the day we hardly break even. We now make our money in the "sunless" hours. That option is not available to solar companies until such time as the issues around storage, be that batteries or any other form, are solved.

When we talk about paying for green energy, anybody who has installed a solar PV on their house has "paid" as they have coughed up money right up front. Even with subsidies it takes years for it to pay for itself and without subsidies the best it can do is mitigate the electricity cost. So I would contend that to some extent we are putting our money where our mouth is.

As I have stated on the Forum before, I am a big fan of solar power ( I have two solar PV installations) but I am not one eyed about it and recognise that there are many issues that surround it. Same with thermal power and in fact I will sing my usual chorus that "There is no power source available today that does not have a fundamental flaw. None"

Regards
Paul

[woodPixel]

Wind lost Kohle in Deutschland als wichtigster Energietrager ab | heise online

[I]From the report: "The share of renewable energies in the amount of electricity generated and fed into the grid domestically rose from 42.3 percent in 2019 to 47.0 percent last year. At 25.6 percent, wind power was the first renewable energy source to have the highest share of the amount of electricity fed into the grid in a given year, replacing coal as the most important energy source. In 2020, 5.4 percent more electricity was generated from wind power than in 2019, when the share had been 22.8 percent..." (Sidenote: Paragraph translated by deepL in seconds; )

I think its short sighted to consider that one form of generation cannot replace another.

I'm a shareholder in a few interesting things, one of those Interesting Things was a major coal plant saying they are building a MONSTER solar array so that when their coal-generating capability closes they can still use their interconnects to fill the pipe.

I also own coal shares, not because what coal does for the generation of power (pure evil), but the very interesting uses that almost-pure carbon has for other industrial processes.

There will be a time, not too far in the future where generations of people will collectively p1ss on all our graves.... "they BURNT oil and coal??????????"......

[elanjacobs]

The one thing that no one wants to talk about, but really should, is nuclear. Australia is one of the best placed countries to use it (we're one of the largest producers of uranium in the world, we're geologically stable and we have vast areas of land to both build plants on and store waste in), yet we won't even consider it.

Current and emerging fission reactor designs are vastly safer, more efficient and produce less waste than those of 20+ years ago and would, IMO, be the ideal replacement for dinosaur juice until true renewables are viable as a permanent option. Or until fusion reactors happen

[Bushmiller]

The one thing that no one wants to talk about, but really should, is nuclear. Australia is one of the best placed countries to use it (we're one of the largest producers of uranium in the world, we're geologically stable and we have vast areas of land to both build plants on and store waste in), yet we won't even consider it.

Current and emerging fission reactor designs are vastly safer, more efficient and produce less waste than those of 20+ years ago and would, IMO, be the ideal replacement for dinosaur juice until true renewables are viable as a permanent option. Or until fusion reactors happen

Elan

You may have picked up from my earlier post that last sentence. The bit about fundamental flaws. Nuclear is no exception. Yes, the more modern reactors are much safer than the old types: Chernobyl and Fukushima were the both the ancient BWR style (Boiling Water Reactor) and it is true that many improvements have been made in recent times, but the fundamental problems have not been resolved. The first and overriding issue is what to do with the waste. Every "solution" so far is just putting off the evil moment like shuffling paper from one tray to the next but never actually dealing with it.

Secondly, make no mistake, they are expensive to build. Think two to three times the cost of a conventional fossil fuelled station at a time when they were permitted. We are looking for private enterprise to put up their hands and fork out piles of money and they will only be generating trough the "sunless" hours. They are now competing with a solar panel. Not looking too promising.

Thirdly, if you have a safety excursion, it is going to be bad: Very bad.

Fourthly, where are you going to put it? It is the same problem as solar. Australia has vast uninhabited areas and that is precisely the point: There is nobody there. The power has to be transmitted via power lines to the load centres, which in Australia are primarily on or close to the coast. The power lines are expensive. The economy, if there ever was one, just flew out the window. So they need to be placed within populated areas. Which one of you is going to put up his or her hand to have it in their backyard? I can categorically tell you it won't be me! Nuclear stations until now have needed plentiful supplies of cooling water so that would be another barrier to the desert regions. It may be that they could use air-cooled condensers (the power station at which I work does this) but I am not aware and have not checked that out. (one for the researchers).

If there is a glimmer of hope with nuclear it would be for a Thorium reactor, but I stress it is only a glimmer. At this point nobody has seriously entertained the idea, although one or two pilot schemes have been trialled. Thorium has the advantage of a short half life of the fuel and a nuclear reaction that can be stopped at the flick of a switch, unlike the uranium or plutonium fuels that just keep going and going like a grotesque and insidious Energiser battery (remember the TV ads by the footballer?). Hence the phrase "The China Syndrome" and film of the same name. In other words, a nuke disaster in the Western hemisphere would keep melting through the core until it reached China: A small exaggeration of course.

So why is there this reluctance to pursue a thorium fuelled reactor? I believe there are some basic problems as in it is more difficult to initiate the chain reaction and indeed keep that reaction going. Anything that can be stopped easily tends to stop itself when you least want this to happen. I would have thought that given some R & D that side of things could be resolved. Probably the expense is still similar to conventional nuclear stations so that issue remains. My own cynical view is that you cannot make a nuclear bomb using thorium. Anybody nation that has nuclear power stations either has or aspires to having a bomb. It is quite a stretch to go from the enrichment necessary for a power station at say 4% to 7% and 94%+ for something that would flatten Sydney, but nations' leaders have wonderful visions and that is where they would like to go given the chance. I don't actually believe they want to flatten Sydney: They just want the capability.

Perhaps that is the final reason for not going nuclear.

Regards
Paul

[elanjacobs]

Chernobyl and Fukushima are always given as example of what could go wrong, but don't forget that there was a series of events that led to those accidents being as bad as they were and I don't believe they are really indicative of the likely problems we could encounter here.

Chernobyl was basically an accident waiting to happen with comically inadequate containment vessels, flammable materials used in the construction of the reactor buildings and flagrant disregard for safety in general (the chief engineer of reactor 3 refused to shut down the reactor despite the roof of the building literally being on fire from the explosion at reactor 4).

The root failure cause of Fukushima wasn't actually the reactor itself, the earthquake detection systems shut the active reactors down safely as they were designed to do, it was the subsequent flooding and disabling of the backup generators for the reactor cooling systems that actually caused the meltdown. This was despite a backup generator failure due to flooding in 1991, a 2000 study recommending measures be put in place to allow for a 15m tsunami (the one that caused the incident was 14m), and a 2008 study outlining the immediate need to better protect the facility from flooding. The 2008 study mentioned tsunami up to 10.2m and was dismissed by management as "unrealistic". If you build a reactor on the most active fault line in the world and ignore the safety warnings, there's a good chance something will blow up.

I'm not trying to suggest that either one would have been entirely prevented, but I'm quite sure they could have been far less severe than they were had appropriate preventative safety measures been taken.

As for location, the closer to me the better; if something catastrophic happens, I'd rather die quickly. I know it's a bit morbid, but I'd rather that than waiting months or years for the inevitable.

[Bushmiller]

As for location, the closer to me the better; if something catastrophic happens, I'd rather die quickly. I know it's a bit morbid, but I'd rather that than waiting months or years for the inevitable.

Elan

If you ever decide on a career in politics I recommend you don't use that statement as your platform. Actually, a large proportion of the population are not too fussed about having even a wind turbine near by and I have a SIL who thinks solar panels are a blight on the skyline so under the circumstances I don't think the population will be receptive to a nuke.

Returning to the Fukushima incident for a moment, it actually brings up the main objection to nukes: Namely that of the waste. The "containment" area is where they stored the spent fuel rods, which are of course a long way off "spent." It exacerbated the incident because they have nowhere to place this material. For a while the Americans used the spent uranium for armour piercing weapons and I think they may still do although internationally this is increasingly frowned upon, but not yet banned.. I think. Otherwise there is currently not much demand for used nuclear fuel.

Yes, the wisdom of hindsight is truly enlightening. Sure they could have done better: They didn't and the holes in the Swiss cheese all lined up.

Regards
Paul

PS: Apologies to the OP. Mick, I am afraid we have digressed a little and I am as much to blame as anybody. I hope somewhere in the seven pages and one hundred posts we have answered your question on electric and hybrid vehicles.

[Chris Parks]

Paul, I was led to believe that the total Australian power consumption was not high enough for even the smallest nuclear power plant and that was one of the reasons it was not considered.

[Glider]

PS: Apologies to the OP. Mick, I am afraid we have digressed a little and I am as much to blame as anybody. I hope somewhere in the seven pages and one hundred posts we have answered your question on electric and hybrid vehicles.

That's OK, Paul. The two posts from people who actually had electric or hybrid cars convinced me to wait and it looks likely that might be only a couple of years.

In response to other posts, I believe that public authorities have to predict demand, provide appropriate infrastructure and stimulate private bodies to do the same. That's what the national census is all about, predicting trends. IMO, the market for electric vehicles is currently being stymied by a lack of public recharging facilities, and in my case, the inability to recharge at home in a private facility. It's the same with the large solar arrays needed to provide the cheap energy needed to make our manufacturing industries internationally competitive. Government policy should be requiring their public facilities to engage actively with private power providers which will stimulate the change needed to use our abundant solar resources. Waiting for the market is exactly that; waiting, not doing. (rant over).

mick

[BobL]

Paul, I was led to believe that the total Australian power consumption was not high enough for even the smallest nuclear power plant and that was one of the reasons it was not considered.

The European countries that have nuclear power are : Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden. About half of these have smaller or significantly smaller populations than Oz. A number of these realise it was a mistake and are shutting their reactors down. Germay has shut down about half of its 17 reactors and plan to phase out completely but the mid 20030's.

My PhD was involved with nuclear waste disposal and for about 20 years after that I was a proponent of nuclear power, but eventually I came to the conclusion that although there's nothing inherently wrong with the science its the implementation that's the problem, and I worry about our governments simply inability to handle anything so potentially dangerous. Just look at the balls up of the NBN and the sheer incompetence over the handling of climate change. Governments have to be heavily involved because they would set the regulatory framework (this is a HUGE task) to manage the process. We simply don't even have the scientists and engineers to even set up the regs so we would have to import these - from where - Maybe France? (anyone say "submarines?")

But the thing that really sticks in my craw with nuclear is it firmly places power/distribution of energy solely in the hands of bureaucrats/multinationals under centralized control. I detest this - we need to decentralise energy so that consumers are as close as possible to being the producers - this makes more of them more aware of costs, usage and how to save power - its better for everyone if this is the case.

I think it would be foolish to chase nuclear power at this stage simply because we do not need to. For the cost of a nuclear program to replace coal we could rebuild the grid (which we need to do anyway) build large solar/wind farms, and install energy storage systems (like a battery in every house that has or gets solar) around the country that could power all of Australia. Nuclear makes some sense for countries which has no sun and little wind for half of the year but for us I increasingly see it as an undesirable way to go.

[Bushmiller]

Thank you Bob for wading in on this one. Knowing your background I hoped you would lend the scientific understanding to the discussion. I smiled to myself when I saw your reference to submarines as that scenario went through my mind when I was typing my earlier post and the prospect of responsible behaviour or lack of it.

Apart from all the problems of nuclear power (as I said before all power sources have at least one flaw) I don't believe there is the economy now for any large scale power station if it is not able to generate for 24 hours per day: It has to be able to do that to stand a chance of recouping the outlay as it is a commercial enterprise. These are a some quotes from my workplace (edited by me in italics to protect confidential information)

"Gone are the days where the units sit at full load all day every day with no ramping.
Solar penetration is increasing year on year, forcing negative midday prices."

That was typically the purpose of the base load stations.

"Voltage instability is becoming a real problem for AEMO and South Australia will soon have to deal with negative demand (another rule change coming). Get your head around negative demand – rooftop PV generation exceeds the demand for electricity. Who pays whom? Who pays for frequency control when there is no demand? No demand does not equal no frequency control… so someone has to pay….. the battle continues."

Frequency control is provided by the traditional generators: Solar at the moment is not equipped to do this with the exception of batteries such as the Tesla installation.

"In addition, the national electricity rules change all the time. Anyone can request a rule change.
We are currently on version 157. 1 year ago, we were on version 133.
That’s 24 rule changes in 12 months (an average of 2 per month!!)."


Life is not quite as simplistic as we are led to believe in the electricity market.

Regards
Paul