The future of energy generation and storage

[qldfrog]

I am afraid SirRumpole it is unlikely.you will have some pro coal per se on the right and so anti coal per se in the labour/ green fanatics
Look here...
Until power stops and people actually die, no hope of a technically and economically sensible outcome..

 

[basilio]

It comes down to multiple parameters all of which need to be met in order for it to work.

Energy, that is power x time, is one and there are lots of ways to do that. Wind, solar, coal, conventional hydro, gas, nuclear, oil etc all do that. Pumped hydro and batteries can not do this however.

Dispatchable power, that is the ability to match input to the grid with load in real time, requires that generating plant can ramp up and down accordingly. In order to do so it needs to have access to an energy source available in real time as required. Coal, conventional or pumped hydro, gas, nuclear, oil or batteries can all do this. Wind and solar cannot directly do this, they can only do it indirectly as the energy source for pumped hydro or batteries (or other methods of storage like running trains up hills etc). Or they can do it crudely when the sun is shining / wind is blowing by simply wasting some of their potential output - but they can only do that so long as the sun / wind doesn't drop below the required level and trouble is that happens extremely often.

System strength, that is a generic term encompassing serious power engineering aspects, requires that generating plant can in real time control frequency and voltage plus deliver high fault currents as required. An inverter and battery system can do part of that but struggles with the fault current. Synchronous condensers can handle the voltage and fault currents but don't add any energy. Big rotating synchronous machines driven by steam / hydro / gas turbines or diesel engines can do the lot. Wind and solar, of themselves, aren't much help hence the situation in SA where wind generation is off loaded at times and gas-fired plant directed to run despite losing money - that's for system strength not because AEMO likes burning gas.

Now if the aim is to have a system which doesn't require fossil fuels then it can be built certainly. Just needs lots of wind and solar, lots of energy storage, big synchronous machines (hydro) and big inverters (batteries) and a sufficient transmission grid and it will all work yes.

Where it goes wrong is when I hear people claiming that building 3000 MW of wind farms in Victoria is somehow replacing the 1500 MW Yallourn power station since both will produce a similar energy output over a 12 month period. Same energy yes but the wind farms aren't adding much dispatchable power at all and do nothing much for system strength either. As such, those wind farms are not actually a replacement for Yallourn.

Now if someone built 1500 MW of large scale pumped hydro to go with the wind farms and put some synchronous condensers in the network in appropriate places well then that's now a replacement. It also works if some (note "some" not "all") of that hydro is replaced with batteries so long as they're big enough.

What I hear a lot of though is akin to suggesting that a truck load of bricks and roof tiles is a replacement for a house. It's a replacement for the bricks and tiles which comprise a house yes but with no framework, ceilings, plumbing, floors and so on it's not an actual replacement for a house it's only part of what's needed to build one.

In saying all that, there's no choice but to ultimately make renewable sources work for the simple reason that's in the name. They're renewable whereas fossils are finite even without considering the CO2 problem. So it has to happen, and it can be done, but we need to build the complete house before knocking the old one down (or having it fall down of its own accord), we can't just dump a few pallets of bricks and tiles on the site and say there's your house.

Great summary Smurf And I'm glad your analysis is understood and accepted by the broad group of posters on ASF.

I will defend my POV however in saying that I totally recognise the complexities of changing an entire power system to renewable energy in a relatively short space of time. In fact of course if we are intending to use electricity to power cars/trucks/buses etc we need to increase the total capacity of our energy system. And on the way through attempt to reduce our energy demand through efficiency measures. (just makes sense )

My argument was simple. We need to move exceptionally quickly along this path and, obviously, all the elements of supply, storage and synchronicity need to be addressed. I brought this up because it is becoming clear that the engineering plant in current system is failing and perhaps more quickly that was imagined. I would also suggest that extended heat waves, higher demands on the systems (because of breakdowns) will a accelerate this process.

It was almost a throw away line but I noted we should not be building new coal fired power stations in any way shape or form. In terms of the economics and the environment our focus needs to be with renewables and the infrastructure required to make them work.

 

[rederob]

Back on renewables generation, this is an excellent read.
It's apparent that Australia will have massive excess energy generation potential and the only issue is how quickly this energy future will be realised.
The short term problems of getting enough energy into south-eastern States next summer may cause some consternation, but in terms of building capacity the question is more about how it is integrated rather than there is a problem.
I do not doubt for a moment that there are technical matters to address, but these are all solvable and comparatively cheap. Possibly more problematic is how the NEM has tied the electricity market in knots which makes technical solutions cumbersome, rather than hard.

 

[rederob]

Until power stops and people actually die, no hope of a technically and economically sensible outcome..

truly bunkum!

 

[basilio]

The AEMO is focusing on the infrastructure required to enable a fast transition to a renewable energy grid.
AEMO pushes storage, new links as renewables head for 60% share
Giles Parkinson 10 July 2019 0 Comments
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The Australian Energy Market Operator, charged with keeping the lights on as it shepherds the country’s grid through a renewable energy revolution, has turned its focus once again on the needs for more storage and more and bigger links between the various state networks.

AEMO boss Audrey Zibelman on Wednesday released the first of a series of “insights” that will lead up to the second, updated version of its Integrated System Plan, its blueprint on how to manage the grid over the next 20 years as it heads towards a 60 per cent share in electricity generation for renewables, and likely much more.

The document includes new analysis on the impact and benefits of the proposed Snowy 2.0 pumped hydro scheme and Tasmania’s rival “battery of the nation” project, which the federal government has committed to (in the case of Snowy), or promised to support (in the case of Tasmania).
It also highlights the critically important role of shorter period storage, such as smaller pumped hydro projects and batteries, in dealing with intraday and overnight needs, and in meeting daily peaks.

And while AEMO sees Snowy and the Tasmania “battery” largely for seasonal and longer period storage, and as a back-up in case of drought and coal plant failures, it sees an important role for them if – as widely expected – coal generators make an early exit from the grid.
https://reneweconomy.com.au/aemo-pushes-storage-new-links-as-renewables-head-for-60-share-69957/

 

[basilio]

This is our energy future.

'Just a matter of when': the $20bn plan to power Singapore with Australian solar
Ambitious export plan could generate billions and make Australia the centre of low-cost energy in a future zero-carbon world

Adam Morton Environment editor


@adamlmorton
Sun 14 Jul 2019 02.52 BST Last modified on Sun 14 Jul 2019 02.55 BST

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There are ambitious solar and wind projects planned for both the Northern Territory and the Pilbara in Western Australia. Photograph: Alice Solar City/AAP
The desert outside Tennant Creek, deep in the Northern Territory, is not the most obvious place to build and transmit Singapore’s future electricity supply. Though few in the southern states are yet to take notice, a group of Australian developers are betting that will change.

If they are right, it could have far-reaching consequences for Australia’s energy industry and what the country sells to the world.

Known as Sun Cable, it is promised to be the world’s largest solar farm. If developed as planned, a 10-gigawatt-capacity array of panels will be spread across 15,000 hectares and be backed by battery storage to ensure it can supply power around the clock.

Overhead transmission lines will send electricity to Darwin and plug into the NT grid. But the bulk would be exported via a high-voltage direct-current submarine cable snaking through the Indonesian archipelago to Singapore. The developers say it will be able to provide one-fifth of the island city-state’s electricity needs, replacing its increasingly expensive gas-fired power.

This will be the channel through which Australian energy production will greatly reduce [global] emissions

Ross Garnaut
After 18 months in development, the $20bn Sun Cable development had a quiet coming out party in the Top End three weeks ago at a series of events held to highlight the NT’s solar potential. The idea has been embraced by the NT government and attracted the attention of the software billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, who is considering involvement through his Grok Ventures private investment firm

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...plan-to-power-singapore-with-australian-solar

https://www.suncable.sg/

 

[basilio]

Why we shouldn't be considering any new coal fired plants.

Age of cheap coal power is over for Australia, says BNEF
Sophie Vorrath 8 May 2019 0 Comments
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The era of cheap coal power in Australia is over; brought to an abrupt end by ever cheaper solar and wind power generation, and by rising coal prices, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s Kobad Bhavnagri.

And, Bhavnagri told the 6th Australasian Emissions Reduction Summit in Melbourne on Wednesday, while this was expected, it has happened more quickly than even the most optimistic predictions.

“This is something that we only projected would occur in the mid 2020s. But the change in economics, particularly the increase in domestic coal pricing, has meant that this tipping point is already upon us today,” Bhavnagri said.

It’s not exactly news – at least not for regular RenewEconomy readers – but it bears repeating, with the federal election less than two weeks away, and the Liberal National Party continuing to insist that coal power is cheap, and fundamental to the health of Australia’s economy.

Certainly, the fact that solar and wind have become the cheapest forms of new bulk electricity supply in almost every major energy market around the world – including Australia – is well accepted, including by the Australian Energy Market Operator.

“It’s cheaper to build new solar and new wind than it is to build new coal or new gas,” Bhavnagri reminded the conference, echoing the findings of a joint CSIRO and AEMO study, and of its own reports.

“It’s also cheapest, now, to build bulk dispatchable capacity from a wind farm, coupled with a battery, than it is to build a new coal-fired power station – or gas.

“The cost of building new peaking generation in Australia now favours batteries. For short durations, for an hour or so, a battery is cheaper than building an open cycle gas turbine or a gas reciprocating engine.”

But the fact that Australia’s existing coal power fleet is – already – no longer the cheapest form of energy generation has not yet sunk in, Bhavnagri says, even against the backdrop of the global climate emergency.

https://reneweconomy.com.au/age-of-cheap-coal-power-is-over-for-australia-says-bnef-31415/

 

[Smurf1976]

It was almost a throw away line but I noted we should not be building new coal fired power stations in any way shape or form. In terms of the economics and the environment our focus needs to be with renewables and the infrastructure required to make them work.

I certainly wouldn't propose building new coal at this point in time.

That's not to say that coal should never have been built, most (not all but most) of it was a rational decision at the time all things considered, but I wouldn't be building more now. Even from a purely financial perspective doing so doesn't make sense.

That said I also wouldn't have closed quite a bit of what has been closed until such time as alternatives were actually built. That's in the same way as I wouldn't trade in my car or sell my house without having the replacement car or somewhere to live already sorted. It's not an argument about coal but a pragmatic one about supply reliability and not being painted into a corner with that.

If it were up to me then I'd also be keeping politicians right out of it. National emissions targets yes, that's a role for government, and let them cut a ribbon and have their photo taken to declare something open if they want to but keep them away beyond that international treaty and ceremonial sort of stuff. Don't let them make decisions on the technical side of how to make things happen as they're massively out of their depth on that.

I'd also like to see a lot less of the public jumping on the bandwagon and a lot more genuine understanding and that goes for all issues not just the energy one. We're living in an era of unprecedented access to information and yet we've got people with entrenched positions on both sides of all sorts of issues but very few among them who can really explain what it's all about. If I'm going to march through the streets, well personally I wouldn't do that without knowing exactly why I'm doing it and having considered the pros and cons of all the options.

The other thing the masses really need to grasp is the concept of resource constraints. Australians seem willing to see water as scarce, which it is or isn't depending on location, but there's a real denial about the situation with gas. There's not a lot left in Bass Strait so far as is known but there's a huge denial about that one from the general public and politicians alike.

There's a good reason why the former SECV saw coal, nuclear and hydro as the only real options in Victoria and had experimental wind and solar up and running in the 1980's whilst seeing the % of electricity generated from coal + hydro (or in other words that not generated from oil or gas) as a key benchmark. It all came down to the reality that there's just not enough oil or gas to be using it that way. If there was, well nobody would muck about with brown coal if they didn't have to given its energy density per unit mass is only 16% that of natural gas or 20% that of oil which are vastly better fuels in every way except their limited supply. My point there isn't "coal is good" but to stress the point about the supply problem with gas.

 

[Smurf1976]

I am afraid SirRumpole it is unlikely.you will have some pro coal per se on the right and so anti coal per se in the labour/ green fanatics

The ideological aspect of it all stands in the way of progress really.

Not much more can be said. Too much politics and not enough action.

 

[basilio]

That's not to say that coal should never have been built, most (not all but most) of it was a rational decision at the time all things considered, but I wouldn't be building more now. Even from a purely financial perspective doing so doesn't make sense.

Creating the SECV in the 1920's to make a unified power grid in Victoria was a masterstroke. And it was not an easy gig. Then (as now) the calls for private electricity suppliers was very loud and it was not an easy ride.

It was also a masterly piece of engineering to make the low value wet brown coal into an effective fuel. Full kudos to Sir John Monash who lead this engineering masterpiece.

But as we know the 21st century is a whole new ball game.

 

[basilio]

Worth recognizing the value of a high quality engineer with outstanding people skills and a very strong will as head of an organisation

Then in late June 1920 came the offer of the general managership of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria, which he was happy to accept, withdrawing from the Reinforced Concrete Co.

His new task was of great public importance, difficulty and attractiveness to an engineer. Making abundant cheap power available by harnessing the huge deposits of Gippsland brown coal would remove a crippling handicap to development of industry. He had strong fellow commissioners—Sir Robert Gibson, (Sir) Thomas Lyle and George Swinburne—and Hyman Herman as chief technical expert; Monash himself was soon appointed chairman. Unexpected high moisture content of the coal produced a grave early crisis, but power from Yallourn, the model garden-town, was turned on in 1924. German technology was used to solve many problems. Monash faced great political difficulties and distrust of the project which required all his forceful pugnacity to overcome; he could not tolerate (Sir) Frederic Eggleston, his minister in 1924-27, who distrusted Monash's 'ruthless egotism'. He survived a major inquiry in 1926, and next year the commission showed a profit. By 1930 the initial task was completed, the S.E.C. grid covered the State and the commission was established as a highly successful state enterprise. Monash himself had inspired a degree of creativity, loyalty and affection, probably unparalleled in any other large Australian corporation then or since. As in the A.I.F. he displayed his gift both of exciting their best from his colleagues and making them his personal friends. 'He was a great leader', Herman wrote, 'and a genius in getting to the heart of any problem and finding its solution … the ablest, biggest-minded and biggest-hearted man I have ever known'.

 

[Smurf1976]

It was also a masterly piece of engineering to make the low value wet brown coal into an effective fuel. Full kudos to Sir John Monash who lead this engineering masterpiece.

The challenge today is different but remarkably similar.

A century ago the problem was that black coal was an unreliable source of energy in Victoria. Local supplies were extremely limited and NSW routinely cut off supplies to Victoria (and SA) plunging both states into crises lasting weeks or months at a time. That practice went on for several decades, it wasn't a one-off by any means.

And so the SECV was established with the specific mandate that it should rely only on resources found within the state of Victoria. Further, it should aim to replace the use of black coal for other purposes so far as practical.

The resources known to exist at the time were brown coal and hydro both of which were applied to the task. Brown coal first, since manufacturing briquettes to fire the existing power stations was a necessary part of the plan and was the first thing up and running (1921) along with building the first station at Yallourn (in operation 1924), then next came the Rubicon and Kiewa hydro schemes and later schemes involving Lake Eildon and finally Dartmouth.

That Yallourn was built was not an objective in itself. It was simply the consequence of defining the problem, identifying all available resources and coming up with a scheme to fix the problem using only those resources considered suitable (that is, those within Victoria).

The same approach has a lot of relevance today. Define the problem (need power), identify all the available resources (wind, solar, hydro, others), design a scheme to fix the problem using only those resources then get on and build it.

The basic history of it all is similar in SA with the Leigh Creek coal mine being developed as the solution to the same underlying problem.

 

[sptrawler]

The same approach has a lot of relevance today. Define the problem (need power), identify all the available resources (wind, solar, hydro, others), design a scheme to fix the problem using only those resources then get on and build it.
.

That is the crux of the matter, as with anything, time is the biggest problem.
Time to design the system, time to procure the land and the equipment, time to install it.
Time that the existing infrastructure can be kept operable, when another couple of major plants are due to be shut down, in the next couple of years.
Hopefully they are a long way down the path, of obtaining the required equipment and suitable locations to install sufficient renewable capacity.
They may well be and we just don't know about it.
Time will tell.

 

[qldfrog]

And the same forces crying for wind and hydro use will then protest and delay projects for years as they do fight new dams or new wind turbine installation
We will run out of time purely due to the legal red tape green tape obstruction
Until blackout and death will enable a postiori emergency power fast setup and solution but then the need for speed might select suboptimal solutions and for a much higher cost

Aka desalination plant and not dams in our last drought in Qld
Hopeless

 

[rederob]

Hopeless

As there is no evidence that your posts have merit, I would agree - hopeless.

 

[basilio]

And the same forces crying for wind and hydro use will then protest and delay projects for years as they do fight new dams or new wind turbine installation
We will run out of time purely due to the legal red tape green tape obstruction
Until blackout and death will enable a postiori emergency power fast setup and solution but then the need for speed might select suboptimal solutions and for a much higher cost

Aka desalination plant and not dams in our last drought in Qld
Hopeless

What an absolute load of rubbish! The groups trying to stop wind turbines have been climate denier fronts. There is little point to large scale hydro dams (Snowy Mountains 2 is a possibility but questionable.). The conversation is about small dams to recycle water as " short term storage batteries" .
There may be good questions about the best design and locality of some of these things but the government that decides to declare an emergency to repower Australia through renewable energy will get the full support of "the greenies".

Hell. They have writing the blueprints for this project for decades. Check out the range of research undertaken on these topics.
https://bze.org.au/research/renewable-energy-plan/

 

[SirRumpole]

There may be good questions about the best design and locality of some of these things but the government that decides to declare an emergency to repower Australia through renewable energy will get the full support of "the greenies".

To use renewable energy efficiently you need storage, and the best way to get storage is hydro.

Greenies have been opposing dams for decades. They keep on finding endangered species to delay projects. One day they have to decide their priorities.

Batteries are expensive and need replacement. So far there doesn't appear to be viable large scale options for storage other than hydro. So , when it comes to the crunch, which way will greenies go ?

 

[rederob]

Batteries are expensive and need replacement. So far there doesn't appear to be viable large scale options for storage other than hydro. So , when it comes to the crunch, which way will greenies go ?

It is nowadays significantly cheaper to attach flow battery storage with renewables, rather than building dams. Flow batteries have lifespans in excess of 20 years.

 

[sptrawler]

It is nowadays significantly cheaper to attach flow battery storage with renewables, rather than building dams. Flow batteries have lifespans in excess of 20 years.

IMO flow batteries will be much more practical in larger installations, than lithium, which are just another problem being built into the system.IMO
However serious long term storage, will definitely be hydro, where it is practical, as Rumpy says the arguments haven't started about the environment. YET.

Lithium is best in the mobile applications such as small vehicles e.g cars and motor bikes, where they can be designed for easy swapping out, in the vehicle design. Also the energy density is more suited for that style of application.
I still feel H2 fuel cell will be used, in heavy mobile installations, such as trucks, trains etc. The batteries would adversely affect the weight carrying capacity and also the energy density isn't enough for long distance haulage. IMO
As I said, only my opinion.

 

[rederob]

However serious long term storage, will definitely be hydro, where it is practical, as Rumpy says the arguments haven't started about the environment.

You can add battery storage to any solar project, and at any scale.
You do not need hills or water, rivers or dams, and the batteries can be integrated into the footprint of a solar project. So no permitting issues or related environmental concerns.
Given best solar sites have little or no practical hydro potential, batteries are a natural fit.
However, I definitely prefer a single solution in moving immediately to large scale hydrogen electrolysis, rather than an intermediate step of adding batteries.