The future of energy generation and storage

[mullokintyre]

The shutting down for maintenance and eventual closure of the Latrobe Valley coal fired plants owned by Energy Australia should come as no surprise to anyone.
Energy Australia is owned by CLP , a Chinese company, which like all Chinese Companies, is there to serve the needs of the motherland.
In its Annual report to the Hong Kong stock exchange, one of its financial highlights says

Losses in our Australia business impacted the Group’s results reflecting the challenges of a market in energy transition. Group Operating Earnings before and after EnergyAustralia fair value movements down by 23% to HK$7,560 million and 51% to HK$4,623 million respectively.

So it would not surprise greatly if it closed them all down.
How smart are we to allow the transfer of ownership of part of a generating infrastructure to a Chinese owned company?
Mick

 

[SirRumpole]

How smart are we to allow the transfer of ownership of part of a generating infrastructure to a Chinese owned company?

Or French for that matter.

Wasn't it Engie that shut down Hazelwood with no notice, therefore taking 5% of the nations power supply out ?

 

[Smurf1976]

The shutting down for maintenance and eventual closure of the Latrobe Valley coal fired plants owned by Energy Australia should come as no surprise to anyone.

So it would not surprise greatly if it closed them all down.

As a technicality Energy Australia only owns one coal-fired plant in the Latrobe Valley such that closing it will indeed be closing them all.

The other two remaining Latrobe Valley coal plants being owned by AGL and Alinta.

 

[Smurf1976]

Exactly. This is something the RBA cannot solve. It's up to governments to take the pressure of gas and electricity price increases.

What they have done so far is not enough.

Trouble is, the extent of the problem.

There's a very long period of doing the wrong thing with all this so it's not going to be fixed quickly. Even if someone throws money, it still takes a long time to get things built.

That we'd come to this point is the fear that engineers and others have had in their minds for a long time now and it has indeed been a long time coming.

To fix it is doable, but on a scale of tasks it's not really comparable to (for example) walking from Melbourne to Geelong. It's more akin to saying you're going to walk to Darwin. Not impossible but it's quite a task.

 

[SirRumpole]

Trouble is, the extent of the problem.

There's a very long period of doing the wrong thing with all this so it's not going to be fixed quickly. Even if someone throws money, it still takes a long time to get things built.

That we'd come to this point is the fear that engineers and others have had in their minds for a long time now and it has indeed been a long time coming.

To fix it is doable, but on a scale of tasks it's not really comparable to (for example) walking from Melbourne to Geelong. It's more akin to saying you're going to walk to Darwin. Not impossible but it's quite a task.

Yes, it won't be easy, but you have to start somewhere.

 

[SirRumpole]

Trouble is, the extent of the problem.

There's a very long period of doing the wrong thing with all this so it's not going to be fixed quickly. Even if someone throws money, it still takes a long time to get things built.

That we'd come to this point is the fear that engineers and others have had in their minds for a long time now and it has indeed been a long time coming.

To fix it is doable, but on a scale of tasks it's not really comparable to (for example) walking from Melbourne to Geelong. It's more akin to saying you're going to walk to Darwin. Not impossible but it's quite a task.

Where would you start ?

 

[sptrawler]

Where would you start ?

By getting people who actually now, to sit down and make a flow chart of how to get to the end result and then working out a sensible time frame for each of the steps, taking into account all the system security, procurement and logistics, environmental, funding and labour availability.
Then when you have that, you estimate the time frame required to achieve the objective, then add a fudge factor for the inevitable time delays.
What we have is an objective and a time frame, now all we need to find is Luigi the magician, to supply the other bits that make it actually happen. ?
This must be the contractor that has to come up with the plan.

 

[Smurf1976]

Where would you start ?

If someone put me in charge with unlimited powers to do whatever's required, then my first steps would be:

*Things which are of benefit under any scenario. Eg resolving the long running issue of controlled load operation in SA and to lesser extent other states.

*Commence with all possible haste a full ecological and economic evaluation of four specific hydro projects located in Qld, NSW and Vic. Followed by the same with other possible projects. The ecological aspect would be conducted by suitably qualified, independent persons.

*Require full disclosure of the remaining technical life of all existing generating plant regardless of ownership.

Once information from the above is available, I'd then take charge of the public debate by laying all the cards on the table face up as to the present situation and the options in detail. The intent will be to get the public on side with a specific path forward but in doing so, it'll be made extremely clear that this is not a hypothetical debate and it is not a debate that will dominate the news for years. It's a discussion to lead a decision with that decision required within weeks.

Based on the outcome of that, detailed engineering design of specific projects proceeding to immediate construction.

Timeframe: I'd be expecting workers on site building before the end of calendar year 2023.

 

[Smurf1976]

In terms of what the options are, there's basically 4 that could plausibly be built (though two of them are pretty unlikely). The figures quoted come from AEMO calculations not mine.

1. Wind, solar, batteries, short duration pumped storage + 19 GW of deep firming capacity, comprising 9GW of existing hydro and Snowy 2.0 and 10GW of intermittently operated fossil fuel plant (in practice gas / diesel).

2. As above but replacing part or all of the gas / diesel plant with more large storage hydro.

3. Nuclear power as a partial or even full alternative to all the above except the existing hydro which would be retained.

4. As per (3) but using coal instead of nuclear. This would represent the abandonment of addressing the climate change issue but technically it's possible so I've included it.

Noting that a combination of approaches is possible. Eg build a bit more hydro to reduce but not eliminate the gas / diesel. Or build a single nuclear power station to reduce the scale of the rest but not eliminate it. Any combination is possible, it's not an "all or nothing" situation since they all produce the same output, they all generate electricity.

That said, realistically, option 1 with perhaps some bits of option 2 is by far the most likely under present circumstances and is the base case scenario. So that is, we build wind, solar, shallow storage (batteries + short duration pumped hydro) and we retain all existing hydro. For long duration storage we might add some more hydro but not to the point of eliminating gas / diesel which does the rest.

Reason to not simply use wind, solar and shallow storage comes down to the problem of multiple consecutive days of poor wind and solar yield. Some will dispute it but suffice to say BOM data, and the real world operating experience of wind and solar installed thus far, both clearly show it to be a problem. That's how AEMO came up with needing 19 GW between large storage hydro and fossil fuels, that's the specific reason for it.

Hydrogen? At some point sure but it's not a commercial off the shelf technology right now and we're unlikely to see a pure hydrogen facility running in the near term. It's still some way off from being a real alternative.

Gas? Beyond a peaking and backup role the basic problem there comes down to a question - what gas? Once we take into account residential, commercial and industrial use of gas "as gas" (that is, not for electricity generation) and we add in committed exports then to be blunt we ain't got no gas. At least not from existing known reserves. It works otherwise but that's the reason it's not seriously on the table as an option beyond a peaking and backup role. Same with oil, it's an imported and fairly costly resource in practice.

 

[sptrawler]

In terms of what the options are, there's basically 4 that could plausibly be built (though two of them are pretty unlikely). The figures quoted come from AEMO calculations not mine.

1. Wind, solar, batteries, short duration pumped storage + 19 GW of deep firming capacity, comprising 9GW of existing hydro and Snowy 2.0 and 10GW of intermittently operated fossil fuel plant (in practice gas / diesel).

2. As above but replacing part or all of the gas / diesel plant with more large storage hydro.

3. Nuclear power as a partial or even full alternative to all the above except the existing hydro which would be retained.

4. As per (3) but using coal instead of nuclear. This would represent the abandonment of addressing the climate change issue but technically it's possible so I've included it.

Noting that a combination of approaches is possible. Eg build a bit more hydro to reduce but not eliminate the gas / diesel. Or build a single nuclear power station to reduce the scale of the rest but not eliminate it. Any combination is possible, it's not an "all or nothing" situation since they all produce the same output, they all generate electricity.

That said, realistically, option 1 with perhaps some bits of option 2 is by far the most likely under present circumstances and is the base case scenario. So that is, we build wind, solar, shallow storage (batteries + short duration pumped hydro) and we retain all existing hydro. For long duration storage we might add some more hydro but not to the point of eliminating gas / diesel which does the rest.

Reason to not simply use wind, solar and shallow storage comes down to the problem of multiple consecutive days of poor wind and solar yield. Some will dispute it but suffice to say BOM data, and the real world operating experience of wind and solar installed thus far, both clearly show it to be a problem. That's how AEMO came up with needing 19 GW between large storage hydro and fossil fuels, that's the specific reason for it.

Hydrogen? At some point sure but it's not a commercial off the shelf technology right now and we're unlikely to see a pure hydrogen facility running in the near term. It's still some way off from being a real alternative.

Gas? Beyond a peaking and backup role the basic problem there comes down to a question - what gas? Once we take into account residential, commercial and industrial use of gas "as gas" (that is, not for electricity generation) and we add in committed exports then to be blunt we ain't got no gas. At least not from existing known reserves. It works otherwise but that's the reason it's not seriously on the table as an option beyond a peaking and backup role. Same with oil, it's an imported and fairly costly resource in practice.

Nailed it smurf. ?

 

[SirRumpole]

4. As per (3) but using coal instead of nuclear. This would represent the abandonment of addressing the climate change issue but technically it's possible so I've included it.

Speaking of coal, China does not appear inhibited by the CC issue, it's flat out building new coal power stations.

China is building six times more new coal plants than the rest of the world combined, new research shows

China approved the construction of another 106 gigawatts of coal-fired power capacity last year — the equivalent of two large coal power plants per week — new research shows.

www.abc.net.au

 

[sptrawler]

Speaking of coal, China does not appear inhibited by the CC issue, it's flat out building new coal power stations.

China is building six times more new coal plants than the rest of the world combined, new research shows

China approved the construction of another 106 gigawatts of coal-fired power capacity last year — the equivalent of two large coal power plants per week — new research shows.

www.abc.net.au

And something that I mentioned would be the probable outcome, to all the pressure being brought to bear on Australian producers, another massive own goal in the making.
Selling off the farm, eventually this has to affect the ability for Australia to fund it standard of living IMO.
Will China be selling the coal it mines in Australia, to its parent company in China, for world market prices, that actually wouldn't make sense, so our net proceeds reduces.
But hey it's all in a good cause, at least we wont be selling it to them, so we can sleep easy. ?

Yancoal seeks to purchase BMA’s Queensland coal mines | Argus Media

Chinese-owned coal producer Yancoal wants to buy BHP Mitsubishi Alliance's (BMA's) Daunia and Blackwater mines to help balance its thermal and metallurgical coal production capabilities.

www.argusmedia.com

 

[mullokintyre]

And something that I mentioned would be the probable outcome, to all the pressure being brought to bear on Australian producers, another massive own goal in the making.
Selling off the farm, eventually this has to affect the ability for Australia to fund it standard of living IMO.
Will China be selling the coal it mines in Australia, to its parent company in China, for world market prices, that actually wouldn't make sense, so our net proceeds reduces.
But hey it's all in a good cause, at least we wont be selling it to them, so we can sleep easy. ?

Yancoal seeks to purchase BMA’s Queensland coal mines | Argus Media

Chinese-owned coal producer Yancoal wants to buy BHP Mitsubishi Alliance's (BMA's) Daunia and Blackwater mines to help balance its thermal and metallurgical coal production capabilities.

www.argusmedia.com

Don't worry @sptrawler, its all part of the great master plan.
Sell off all the coal mines to the Chinese, pocket the money, then put massive export royalties on coal to buy Carbon Credits to offset the coal selling.
On a similar note, just heard that a Canadian pension fund has spent about 8mill buying p a series of orchards here in the GV.
We could apply the same principal to apples and pears.
Mick

 

[sptrawler]

Don't worry @sptrawler, its all part of the great master plan.
Sell off all the coal mines to the Chinese, pocket the money, then put massive export royalties on coal to buy Carbon Credits to offset the coal selling.
On a similar note, just heard that a Canadian pension fund has spent about 8mill buying p a series of orchards here in the GV.
We could apply the same principal to apples and pears.
Mick

Like this you mean?

The $1bn lithium mine China might pick up on the cheap​

A West Australian lithium producer faces accusations it has dodged state mining royalties while shifting its profits to China, amid a messy battle for control.

 

[Sean K]

Speaking of coal, China does not appear inhibited by the CC issue, it's flat out building new coal power stations.

China is building six times more new coal plants than the rest of the world combined, new research shows

China approved the construction of another 106 gigawatts of coal-fired power capacity last year — the equivalent of two large coal power plants per week — new research shows.

www.abc.net.au

 

[sptrawler]

View attachment 153915

Yes in this thread a couple of years back, it was mentioned China had 105 coal fired power station announced.
It looks like they will be buying up our coal mines to supply them, which is nice of us.

 

[Sean K]

Yes in this thread a couple of years back, it was mentioned China had 105 coal fired power station announced.
It looks like they will be buying up our coal mines to supply them, which is nice of us.

And they don't have to start reducing emissions till 2060, 3 decades after the World explodes.

India is on the same trajectory, just a few years behind.

There is something wrong with this plan.

 

[mullokintyre]

Nah, nothing wrong with that plan from a Chinese or Indian perspective.
mick

 

[Sean K]

Nah, nothing wrong with that plan from a Chinese or Indian perspective.
mick

Well, they need to get a few hundred million out of poverty, which I support. But they won’t do that with bird choppers, toxic mirrors and inefficient little batteries. It’s such a shame we timed nuclear energy with the nuclear bomb in the 40s. If not for the bomb, we’d probably have emissions free 24/7 energy now.

 

[sptrawler]

Ideology is starting to run into reality.

'The deadline was yesterday': With renewable energy sources well behind schedule, how will WA keep the lights on?

New data shows the state received just 5 per cent of the renewable energy capacity that companies committed to last year, raising concerns about whether coal-fired power stations will be able to close at the end of the decade.

www.abc.net.au