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The future of energy generation and storage

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If Australia goes nuclear we will be moving....

One of the many things I love about this country is the fact that it doesn't rely on nuclear power...
 
I assume because of the potential for radiation exposure Canoz? Or the fact that you dont think its necessary in a land blessed with natural gas, sunshine and at least some hydro?
 
At this point in time, nuclear is probably the only realistic way, to transition to 'clean' energy in a reasonable timeframe.
Anything else will take 30-50 years. IMO
 
The fear paradigm is the single biggest obstacle to nuclear uptake, and the irony is that the nuclear industry built and continues to instill this fear through its safety and regulatory bodies.

As an example, the safety bodies continue to use a Liner no threshold model for radiation dosing that is contentious. I won't bore you with the pro and con arguments (you can argue it both ways), but it is the foundation from which springs policy, regulatory and design considerations.

I think the biggest lessons learnt from Fukushima is that there was a lack of understanding and high levels of confusion following the disaster which compounded the misery of their citizens. Education has to reach the highest level policy makers.
 
It's not just a fukushima style event that bothers me, its just not as clean a fuel as people think. You've got to dig the stuff up and then bury it all somewhere too...
 
If you can’t safely drive around the paddock or car park in an old Corolla then I think most would agree that driving a V8 at highway speeds in heavy rain would not be a wise move.

Likewise it would not be wise to go nuclear because we can’t manage to properly maintain and operate the comparatively straightforward subcritical coal-fired plants we’ve got.

Suffice to say things aren’t going at all well there and if the truth were known to the media it would probably be headline news.

The people of NSW should be thankful that the various Queensland government owned electricity generators, Snowy Hydro, an assortment of privately owned gas-fired plants in Victoria and SA as well as Hydro Tasmania are between them filling the gap and keeping the lights shining in Sydney.

There’s a lot of coal-fired capacity that’s not in running condition at the moment. A lot.
 
CanOz said:
It's not just a fukushima style event that bothers me, its just not as clean a fuel as people think. You've got to dig the stuff up and then bury it all somewhere too...
Click to expand...
Better than digging it up and then releasing it into the atmosphere.

Nuclear plants can literally point to their pollution, because it sits in pools and dry casks, coal plants can’t.
 
To clarify my previous comments about NSW coal-fired plant, here's the current status:

Bayswater = 3 out of 4 units operational
Eraring = 2 out of 4 units operational
Liddell = 3 out of 4 units operational at reduced capacity
Mt Piper = 1 out of 2 units operational
Munmorah = closed and partly blown up with explosives
Redbank = mothballed not running
Vales Point = 1 out of 2 units operational
Wallerawang C = closed being demolished

For Victoria:
Anglesea = closed and blown up with explosives
Hazelwood = closed being dismantled
Loy Yang A = 3 of 4 units operational
Loy Yang B = Both units operational
Morwell = closed and becoming derelict apart from some temporary diesel generators sitting outside
Yallourn = 2 of 4 units operational

For SA:
Northern = closed and blown up
Playford B = closed and partly torn down, partly blown up

Changing the means of producing the steam won't fix the overall situation any more than changing brokers will make your trading profitable. The problems in the industry are far bigger than that.

I'm not outright opposed to nuclear but I'm opposed to it until such time as the focus is shifted toward engineering and away from politics and financial games. Those things are bad enough with coal or gas, potentially catastrophic with nuclear.

On other matters well this Smurf now lives in SA doing something different but for the record Hydro Tas recorded a $168 million profit last financial year. That's in a competitive national market, except for the fact that Hydro prices below market for sales within Tasmania, and for the record yes it most certainly does have the same costs for tax that a private entity does. Not bad for something that hasn't cost the taxpayers a cent and which the Feds proclaimed back in 1914 to be a pointless venture.

At least Vic and SA received a pile of cash when they sold it all. In NSW they basically gave much of it away so I've no idea how that stacks up. :2twocents
 
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Whats the installed wind capacity in Australia? I notice that at 5:30pm wind was producing just 236MW, yet earlier in the week it was producing 3400MW at one stage. With the exception of snowy 2.0 are there any other hydro projects that have been given the go ahead?
 
explod said:
Vanadium (better than Lithium) looks like the next big advance for batteries, storage in particular and they are giving them a 20 year battery life.

Forget fossil fuels, the sun wind and water currents will very shortly have it all licked. Vanadium can also store the power for up to a year.

Click to expand...

A repost, I cannot believe that no one has taken note of this revolution on the way.
 

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