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The future of energy generation and storage

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A contractor doing work in Victoria has broken Basslink (the Vic - Tas power cable) with repairs likely to take until at least mid-April.

This is onshore damage not offshore.

There shouldn’t be any problems maintaining power supply in any state but that’s largely due to timing since loads are well below the peak at this time of year plus Easter reduces consumption further. Still not good to have contractors breaking things though.

There’s no immediate need to run them but three gas-fired generators in Tas that haven’t had much use in recent times were given a thorough test run today just in case they’re needed. The other two have been run recently enough to not need a test as such. There’s no need to run them now so they’re off after the test but they’re ready to go if needed.
 
Jeez, how does one break Basslink? What’s the diameter of that cable?
 
SirRumpole said:
Would the contractor be foreign by any chance ?
Click to expand...
No idea.

Basslink is privately owned by Keppel Infrastructure Trust.

Hydro Tasmania has (in layman's terms as it's rather complex) financial obligations and usage rights but doesn't own or operate it as such.

So Basslink have had a planned outage and doing some works and during that a contractor has caused damage at the AC - DC (since Basslink is a DC link and the grid is AC) conversion station in Victoria.

At the moment they're saying it'll be out until mid-April but nobody's counting on that being a precise date.

In terms of the effects, it amounts to a weakening of the system but it's not posing an immediate problem in any state. It does increase vulnerability however, particularly in Tas and Vic but there are flow on effects elsewhere (particularly SA) depending on circumstances, but there would need to be another major problem to actually put the lights out in any state. So the overall system is weaker but not to the point of causing a problem as such. Just more exposed in the event that anything else goes wrong. Reason is simply that load is low at this time of year due to seasonal factors.

So the implications at this stage are economic in practice. Cost to fix the damage. Cost of running higher cost generation in place of cheaper supply that could have been obtained in either direction across the link. A reduced ability to take other plant out for maintenance which may impose some costs of rescheduling.
 
For those with an interest in technical things:

http://www.wattclarity.com.au/2018/03/power-system-frequency-what-is-it-doing-why-does-it-matter/

The crux of what's said is that the approach to controlling the system across Qld, NSW/ACT, Vic, SA is at best described as "sloppy" and that leads to an unnecessary vulnerability to a system collapse (like what happened in SA) occurring across a much wider area (worst case would be whole lot goes down).

It's one of those things that might not happen or it might but there's a vulnerability which ought not exist.
 
Adding to the previous post, the underlying concern is that there has been a marked deterioration in recent times and it’s getting worse.

It’s one of those warning signs that won’t matter until suddenly it does in a big way.

Suffice to say if my car’s brakes were feeling “loose” then I’d be finding out what’s going on without delay and wouldn’t be ignoring the change just because they’re still working.
 
SirRumpole said:
This may interest some.

Coal to hydrogen project.

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World-first coal to hydrogen plant trial launched in Victoria

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-12/coal-to-hydrogen-trial-for-latrobe-valley/9643570
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SirRumpole said:
This may interest some.

Coal to hydrogen project.

Print Email Facebook Twitter More
World-first coal to hydrogen plant trial launched in Victoria

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-04-12/coal-to-hydrogen-trial-for-latrobe-valley/9643570
Click to expand...

Still has the trouble of what to do with those pesky carbon atoms once you have separated the hydrogen from them.
 
Value Collector said:
Here is Europes biggest pumped hydro storage, for all the pumped hydro fans.
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Strangely enough I’ve been right outside it but didn’t go into the power station or even the visitors centre.

On holidays you see. It may however have caused Ms Smurf some temporary stress to realise that despite being on the other side of the world we’d turned up at a place with lots of transmission lines and a dam.

Not to worry though, we were there for the steam trains and it’s not a bad ride. One train goes on flat land beside the lake. Another one goes up the mountain and that’s more exciting. The slate mining museum was interesting too.
 
Value Collector said:
Still has the trouble of what to do with those pesky carbon atoms once you have separated the hydrogen from them.
Click to expand...
For the pilot plant they’re not going to worry about it, it’s a truly trivial amount after all, but if a permanent operation were to be set up then the idea is to pump it into the depleted Bass Strait gas fields as a nearby place proven over millions of years as suitable for storing gas.

This would be a lot easier than trying to capture CO2 from power stations since it’s a relatively pure gas stream.

Economics and practical aspects of the whole thing are somewhat uncertain hence spending $500 million to find out (that being loose change when it comes to anything of this natue).
 
Smurf1976 said:
but if a permanent operation were to be set up then the idea is to pump it into the depleted Bass Strait gas fields as a nearby place proven over millions of years as suitable for storing gas.

This would be a lot easier than trying to capture CO2 from power stations since it’s a relatively pure gas stream.

.
Click to expand...

Has that even been done before?

Economics and practical aspects of the whole thing are somewhat uncertain hence spending $500 million to find out (that being loose change when it comes to anything of this natue)
Click to expand...

Yes, it comes done to the economics in the end.

ie. Does the end result of mining the coal, separating the hydrogen, transporting and storing the carbon, then distributing the hydrogen end up with enough hydrogen to sell to cover the costs of the whole process.

I have no idea, but running a car on hydrogen from natural gas is already more expensive than charging an EV, and thats without the carbon capture.
 
Value Collector said:
Has that even been done before?
Click to expand...
It’s routine practice in the oil and gas industry historically as a means of increasing oil recovery and more recently for environmental reasons.

As for the overall project, whether it’s viable remains to be seen but I’m not overly confident that it will be.
 
Sweden is developing electric charging of cars and trucks through electric rails embedded in the road.

Be interested to know how much power can be transferred and if these short term fillups would be detrimental to battery backs.

World's first electrified road for charging vehicles opens in Sweden
Stretch of road outside Stockholm transfers energy from two tracks of rail in the road, recharging the batteries of electric cars and trucks

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...ed-road-for-charging-vehicles-opens-in-sweden
 

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