The future of energy generation and storage

[rederob]

Incorrect yet again,

What is?

I have a belief that Australia has put in considerable renewable generation already, with minimal Government intervention and taxpayers money.

Much less than Europe, but the fact we have put in a lot of renewables is not the point, is it.
Renewables not backed up with dispatchable supply is the problem.

That is about to change, so be it.

How so?
This is a transition 25 years in the making and counting....

But if you are going to make an aspersion, at least be accurate, that should be a another light bulb moment for you.

What's the aspersion I am making?

As for comparing Europe to Australia, well that just highlights your lack of understanding, of the underlying problems associated with HV transmission grids.

There is no such problem. Stop making up nonsense.
Either that or explain yourself.

 

[SirRumpole]

Industry players in Australia put to government what was necessary for an orderly transition of our energy generation capacity, and Finkel clearly outlined it in his Blueprint.

Yes, the worst failure of governance in recent history imo.

Finkel as a scientist and engineer was uniquely qualified to say what was needed, but then the politicians and vested interests decided that they knew better.

We may have put in a lot of rooftop solar, but the grid has not been upgraded to deal with its intermittency as sufficient storage has not been installed as it should have been had we listened to Finkel.

 

[sptrawler]

What is?


Renewables not backed up with dispatchable supply is the problem.

That is why the last Govt committed to building Kurri Kurri and Snowy 2.0, which you say isn't required, it will be dispatchable supply, make up your mind, it is either required or not required, I wish you would keep your story straight.

How so?
This is a transition 25 years in the making and counting....

It certainly is and the Finkel report you quoted was 5 years ago, so we are still at the beginning and punching well above our weight.

What's the aspersion I am making?

That I have irrational beliefs, all my beliefs are rational, just because you can't understand something that isn't explained to your satisfaction doesn't make it irrational. Maybe your personality traits limit the way information can be processed, who knows?

There is no such problem. Stop making up nonsense.
Either that or explain yourself.

Comparing our grid which is one of the Worlds longest interconnected power systems, with a compact highly integrated and heavily loaded mature grid like Europe is just ridiculous.
The challenges that face Australia's transmission system is very unique and the size of the population funding the integration of renewables is by comparison very small, there are very few metrics regarding power and distribution that you can compare Europe with Australia. Size, Loading, Security, Interconnection options, reactive current control, per capita funding etc, Europe is completely different
But as always that doesn't come into the equation, when your running with your spin.
It is like comparing your ability to go off grid versus Twiggy Forrests, I know who would have the better set up and have it up and running faster. But that wouldn't be a fair comparison, would it?

 

[rederob]

That is why the last Govt committed to building Kurri Kurri and Snowy 2.0, which you say isn't required, it will be dispatchable supply, make up your mind, it is either required or not required, I wish you would keep your story straight.

I never said it was never required, so read my earlier comments.
What is at issue are the wind and solar capacity additions that have no backup.

It certainly is and the Finkel report you quoted was 5 years ago, so we are still at the beginning and punching well above our weight.

We are behind.
That's the problem!

That I have irrational beliefs, all my beliefs are rational, just because you can't understand something that isn't explained to your satisfaction doesn't make it irrational. Maybe your personality traits limit the way information can be processed, who knows?

If your car breaks down and you leave it, will it fix itself?
If the NEM breaks down, will it fix itself?
Self resolving means nothing else is needed. What you mean is that intervention is necessary.
I have made that point to you many times and you keep failing to grasp the logic.

Comparing our grid which is one of the Worlds longest interconnected power systems, with a compact highly integrated and heavily loaded mature grid like Europe is just ridiculous.

Completely missing the point again.
Europe has had to achieve inter-national cooperation to transfer its renewable energy across the continent. It has done this with 50% greater renewable penetration than we have in Australia, and it has lesser natural energy resources apart from water.
Your point about Europe being a mature grid is not accurate in respect of the distribution structure it needs for renewables. It's in a massive transitory phase and the embargo on Russian oil will accelerate their plans:

"As it stands, most EU countries are struggling to keep up the pace of necessary grid build-out for achieving Europe’s decarbonisation targets."​

But as always that doesn't come into the equation, when your running with your spin.

I keep linking to sources that explain my points, and you shoot blanks.

 

[sptrawler]

I never said it was never required, so read my earlier comments.

I think calling it a 'white elephant' would qualify.

We are behind.
That's the problem!

As happens with projects, you know supply issues, reconfiguring HV transmission lines, installing new transmission lines, pandemics etc. It isn't as easy as putting in pink batts you know and even that can give problems.
Now we have the right plan, the right team, I'm sure we will speed up the process to renewables.

If your car breaks down and you leave it, will it fix itself?
If the NEM breaks down, will it fix itself?
Self resolving means nothing else is needed. What you mean is that intervention is necessary.
I have made that point to you many times and you keep failing to grasp the logic.

I made an off the cuff remark to Rumpy that there is no need to worry, the issues regarding available power will be resolved, as they can't be left unresolved, therefore I said it will be self resolving.
The mere fact you can't get over the use of a colloquialism, goes a long way to explain your fixation on issues and is a very unattractive character trait.?
If I said you were talking $hit, would that mean excrement was coming out of your mouth? No, it would mean you are talking nonsense, I guess you would have heard the phrase occasionally. See that is another colloquialism, that is based on an inaccuracy.

Completely missing the point again.
Europe has had to achieve inter-national cooperation to transfer its renewable energy across the continent. It has done this with 50% greater renewable penetration than we have in Australia, and it has lesser natural energy resources apart from water.
Your point about Europe being a mature grid is not accurate in respect of the distribution structure it needs for renewables. It's in a massive transitory phase and the embargo on Russian oil will accelerate their plans:

"As it stands, most EU countries are struggling to keep up the pace of necessary grid build-out for achieving Europe’s decarbonisation targets."​

I keep linking to sources that explain my points, and you shoot blanks.

As I said comparing Europe to Australia is ridiculous, the fact that Europe has a higher percentage of renewables than us makes sense, they emit a lot more greenhouse gas than us, so one would hope they are mitigating it at a faster rate than us.
I would hope China and the U.S are also, as between them they are causing the vast majority of global warming.
Do you know we have a higher penetration of renewables than Botswana.
At the end of the day to stop the temperature rise those that pour the most CO2 into the atmospher are going to have to do the most work to reduce it.
How many new coal stations are China currently building?

The EU should be applauded, especially France with its nuclear and the Scandinavian countries with their abundance of hydro and a big mention should go to Russia for supplying the gas to allow Germany to close their coal stations.

 

[Smurf1976]

Finkel as a scientist and engineer was uniquely qualified to say what was needed, but then the politicians and vested interests decided that they knew better.

We may have put in a lot of rooftop solar, but the grid has not been upgraded to deal with its intermittency as sufficient storage has not been installed as it should have been had we listened to Finkel.

This all gets down to something much deeper.

Government itself has largely lost interest in anything and anyone who could be classified as a scientist, engineer or otherwise technical. That goes for both major parties and it's across state, federal and in some cases even local government.

Since ~1990 pretty much everything that could be described as a workshop, depot, laboratory or engineering office within government has one by one been outsourced, privatised or is at best a shadow of what it once was.

The most obvious institution, the electricity industry, has been the greatest target in many states but the same rings true for all sorts of things. TAFE, another institution of sorts, has been similarly gutted.

State roads departments aren't a bad example. First they got rid of the manual labourers and construction machinery, then they got rid of the painters and electricians, then out went the engineering assistants, then the engineers. They kept going and all that's left now are contract administrators. Strangely, every road project now costs a fortune....

Then there's building inspections, railways, TAFE and everything else that was done by government a generation ago and which most people would associate with workshops, trades, manual work and so on.

That isn't simply about those workers per se but, having seen quite a bit, it's a far more deep seated disdain for all things technical or scientific from government itself. In short, if you want to end up in a senior position in government, become a lawyer first. Anything technical, from structural engineering to medicine, generally won't get you taken anywhere near as seriously.

The real, ultimate cause of the system black in SA wasn't wind, it wasn't coal and it wasn't really transmission towers collapsing either. Rather, it's that we didn't take a proper engineering approach to the whole thing and instead took a legal approach.

Engineering approach = these wind turbines are a new thing, we need to thoroughly investigate them, make sure we've understood everything, conduct tests if necessary, before we install enough that failure would be a problem. That doesn't mean we won't use them, it does mean we'll make sure we know all about them and don't have nasty surprises.

Legal approach = contract says they're fine and will cause no trouble.

Now I've noting against laws and lawyers to be clear, but if we're to stop messing things up well then we really need to be taking a proper, scientific approach to all this rather than just taking the word of someone selling a product with a vested interest in saying it's all OK.

Same goes for climate change, building inspections and all manner of other things. If we want to stop having these problems well we need to get back to taking science and its practical application seriously and stop seeing the world solely through a prism of contracts and laws.

That goes beyond the professional level. There's more than a few tradies, the older ones, shaking their heads saying that what's being done in reality doesn't match what needs to be done. They're not fools, they know full well that we're making some monumental blunders as a country that'll cost a fortune to fix. They're referring to residential by the way.....

 

[rederob]

I think calling it a 'white elephant' would qualify.

Not exactly what you claimed I said, and vey different to lot's of smaller pumped hydro that could now be operational with a mindset focussed on urgency rather than grandiosity.

I made an off the cuff remark to Rumpy that there is no need to worry, the issues regarding available power will be resolved, as they can't be left unresolved, therefore I said it will be self resolving.

I know what you keep saying, but it's illogical. A decision maker steps in and "solves" the problem. This time it was AEMO, and on top of them are the ESB advising the next decision maker, which is the new federal government. Three different entities are needed to drive this long term fix and apply it to the NEM (aka "self" in your colloquial sense)

See that is another colloquialism, that is based on an inaccuracy.

FYI, self solving has always been a medical term, and if you try to use it in a colloquial sense it still has to have the same sense. That is, the entity heals itself or, at least, nobody else is involved or gets involved. It's antithesis is "physician, heal thyself".

As I said comparing Europe to Australia is ridiculous, the fact that Europe has a higher percentage of renewables than us makes sense, they emit a lot more greenhouse gas than us, so one would hope they are mitigating it at a faster rate than us.

Go back and read my question of you and your response about HVDC.
The issue of our NEM being large and complex is different to Europe being small but significantly more complex.
In both cases we are talking about grids stressing over incorporating renewables. China is having the same problems, and curtailment issues there are not going away:

China’s Renewable Energy Fleet Is Growing Too Fast for Its Grid​

 

[SirRumpole]

Go back and read my question of you and your response about HVDC.
The issue of our NEM being large and complex is different to Europe being small but significantly more complex.
In both cases we are talking about grids stressing over incorporating renewables. China is having the same problems, and curtailment issues there are not going away:

China’s Renewable Energy Fleet Is Growing Too Fast for Its Grid​

Wasting energy is pretty abhorrent.

Why couldn't this 'waste' be channeled into home hot water heaters at a reduced price ?

These are the sort of design issues a properly managed grid will have to deal with, another reason why it needs to be driven by a panel of experts, not politicians or wide eyed greenies.

 

[sptrawler]

China’s Renewable Energy Fleet Is Growing Too Fast for Its Grid​

Just in case you hadn't noticed so is ours.


Anyway time to move on from your circular argument, I'm sure readers are getting as bored with it as I am.

We can discuss how the East Coast gets itself out of the situation it is in, where it is up $hit creek, in a barb wire canoe without a paddle, I bet that made someone's head do a 360 degree turn.
Now we can debate how a barb wire canoe doesn't float, with our OCD members.?

 

[rederob]

China’s Renewable Energy Fleet Is Growing Too Fast for Its Grid​

Just in case you hadn't noticed so is ours.

That was the point I made, so maybe you should read what I write.

 

[sptrawler]

That was the point I made, so maybe you should read what I write.

I'm past that, you have sucked all the enjoyment out of the thread.

 

[Belli]

Same goes for climate change

Spoke last week to a number who are involved in this issue. They simply took out the papers kept in the bottom draw for a few years, updated the data and are to, or already have, present the data and conclusions to the relevant bodies in Government including presentations to the IPCC. Now waiting as they are not the ones who can actually implement action.

 

[Eager]

If there is one thing I can take credit for, is to drag you down from your ivory tower.?

How silly. You saying I'm in an ivory tower must mean that you have an inferiority complex.

 

[sptrawler]

How silly. You saying I'm in an ivory tower must mean that you have an inferiority complex.

Like I said, it is great to see you posting in this thread, I've never noticed you post in this thread before.
But it is always great to have new input, even if it isnt thread related.

 

[sptrawler]

It sounds as though some home truths are starting to come out. At least everyone will end up on the same page. The article puts things in perspective and does kind of repeat what smurf and I have been saying for quite some time.

Coal, gas to smooth transition to clean power: Top energy officials

Australia’s switch to zero emissions needs a market reform that pays coal, gas and renewables to power the electricity grid, the Energy Security Board says.

www.smh.com.au

 

[SirRumpole]

It sounds as though some home truths are starting to come out. At least everyone will end up on the same page. The article puts things in perspective and does kind of repeat what smurf and I have been saying for quite some time.

Coal, gas to smooth transition to clean power: Top energy officials

Australia’s switch to zero emissions needs a market reform that pays coal, gas and renewables to power the electricity grid, the Energy Security Board says.

www.smh.com.au

Apart from the fact that Smurf said he wouldn't be building gas stations ?

 

[sptrawler]

There isn't really any other options IMO, if you want to remove coal in a timely manner, to use renewables will be time consuming as issues will crop up that they haven't even dreamt of and will need resolving.
Gas is a direct substitute, that suits working with renewables much better and the installation time isn't overly long.
Smurf is a big renewables fan, as most of us are, but timelines are the enemy.

 

[SirRumpole]

There isn't really any other options IMO, if you want to remove coal in a timely manner, to use renewables will be time consuming as issues will crop up that they haven't even dreamt of and will need resolving.
Gas is a direct substitute, that suits working with renewables much better and the installation time isn't overly long.

Not being technical, I'll let others more qualified argue about the technicalities, but are we talking about gas peaking plants which are very expensive to run but can be started or stopped quickly or combined cycle plants which are cheaper to run but are generally run for longer periods ?

 

[SirRumpole]

Lifetime GGE for various forms of energy.

 

[sptrawler]

Not being technical, I'll let others more qualified argue about the technicalities, but are we talking about gas peaking plants which are very expensive to run but can be started or stopped quickly or combined cycle plants which are cheaper to run but are generally run for longer periods ?

My guess, would be high efficiency open cycle gas turbines, these days there isn't a huge difference in the efficiency, not like 30 years ago where open cycle were in the low 20% efficiency. Combines cycle has the problem of requiring operators and to get the steam set on presents the same issues that are plaguing the coal generators, cycling.
HEGT's these days are in the mid 40% efficiency, whereas combined cycle are in the low 50's, so IMO the increased flexibility and much shorter start up times makes the HEGT's the best option.
At least the report resolved the issue, 'here is what is required, now decide who, when and with what you are going to implement it'. The choices are yours, interestingly as I also said the States are basically the ones who are responsible for their generation, the article seems to reinforce that. The States just have to work out which route they are going to take.