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The future of energy generation and storage

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Regardless of arguments for or against coal, in my view that's the single best argument I've yet seen for government ownership.

The idea that Australian industry and society could be left literally in the dark due to a few bullies just isn't acceptable.

I say bullies because that's exactly what activists are. In their world yes means yes, no means yes. That's their approach - a born to rule attitude under which either you consent voluntarily to their demands or they'll do it by means of threats, intimidation and ultimately force. In any other context that's a crime, and a fairly serious one at that.

I'm all for free speech and public debate but activism has gone well beyond that.

Whilst that's a bit off the subject of energy, I've made the comment because it's the industry being targeted and it's not limited to coal.
 
Yes, governments need to get back into energy ownership. Hazlewood should have been a warning of things to come.

Stephen Miles is promising to establish a government owned energy retailer, but it looks like he won't get the chance to do it.
 
SirRumpole said:
Yes, governments need to get back into energy ownership. Hazlewood should have been a warning of things to come.

Stephen Miles is promising to establish a government owned energy retailer, but it looks like he won't get the chance to do it.
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Once something is sold off, it is very hard for a Govt to get back into the game, too many vested interests and then the arguments that public money is undermining business with taxpayers money and subsidies.

The only way they can get back in, is with new technology ie nuclear, or by supplying necessary plant, that the private sector wont supply, as in Kurri Kurri and Snowy 2.0.
 
sptrawler said:
The only way they can get back in, is with new technology ie nuclear, or by supplying necessary plant, that the private sector wont supply, as in Kurri Kurri and Snowy 2.0.
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There's also a third way, the one that happened with railways in Tasmania.

A long time ago it had the very to the point name of the Tasmanian Government Railways or TGR. That was it's actual name.

Then in the 1970's the federal government wanted to take it over and did so, renaming it to AN Tasrail (AN = Australian National).

Then in the 90's the feds privatised it.

Then the private operator ran it into the ground to the point of complete dysfunction. A train couldn't get from one end of the state to the other without a high probability of derailment even at literally walking pace. The track, locos and rolling stock were outright stuffed. A somewhat incredible outcome given, to state the obvious, trains in Tasmania aren't exactly traveling huge distances. It's a pretty simple network with only 611km of track in total that's in use, plus another 232km of disused track that related mostly to obsolete mining ventures and other industrial use. So it's not exactly a big system, and it's all diesel none of it's electric, and it's only hauling freight not passengers, so maintaining it ought be a cinch for any railway company that's even remotely competent.

Long story short it's now state government owned and branded TasRail. Pretty much everything's new or rebuilt.

Separate to freight the state also owns the West Coast Wilderness Railway although that's run as a separate operation in terms of accounting and so on, given it's a tourist steam train running on a track that isn't connected to the rest of the rail system and is a very different business. That too had the same problem of the private operator walking away however, that's how it ended up in government ownership. FWIW the locos are oil-fired for the steam not coal, key advantage being no sparks from oil. Not much point having a train through the wilderness if it sets said wilderness on fire. Nobody seems to object on the grounds of authenticity, it's still a real historic steam train just with a different fuel being used in the boiler.

With electricity Tamar Valley CCGT also has a similar saga, the Hydro being its fourth owner. It was Alinta who decided to build it, then sold to another private company, then taken over by another state-owned company to physically complete the half-built project, then ended up financially transferred to Hydro Tas when the politicians and everyone else gave up basically.

To Alinta's credit at least they bought decent equipment - the CCGT plant (208MW total, one gas turbine and one steam) is all Mitsubishi, and they bought a separate smaller (58MW) Rolls Royce open cycle unit to go with it. Just took three owners to get it assembled on site and a fourth to own it, that's all.

Incidentally the other state owned company decided to colour code everything, which wasn't too bad an idea. All CCGT stuff is painted green, all OCGT stuff is blue. Even on a satellite view that's immediately apparent: https://www.google.com/maps/@-41.14...try=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MTAwOC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw==

 
Yes that's what we are talking about when we talk of cycling units, in W.A we have been two shifting units for years, but they are a lot smaller than the Eastern States units.
However it does knock the hell out of them constantly cooling them to take them off and re heating them to get them back on.
The other issue is a lot of fuel is wasted bring them on and off, but it will be required more and more so they will have to get used to it.
 
Smurf1976 said:
Looked blank?
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Yes best defense I have without starting an argument, never works the long suffering wife knows I can pretty much fix everything that goes beep (after watching youtube) and have an opinion about most things usually the next question is "what have you done wrong?" .
 
Getting Back on the topic, it seems that aspirations of the feds for more offshore wind have been dealt a bit of blow after two companies who had previously got together in a partnering to put a bid in for the project have eft the stage.



I wonder which part of the project did not stack up for them?
Mick
 
Well, if decisions are going to be made based on the loud voices of a few people who don't want their view interrupted then there is not much hope for a lot of potential projects.
 
SirRumpole said:
Well, if decisions are going to be made based on the loud voices of a few people who don't want their view interrupted then there is not much hope for a lot of potential projects.
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They are far enough out to sea that they will hardly be visible.

The dead sea life washing up on the shore may stink a bit but most of the wokeys don't live near the shoreline or walk the beach very often

Off Newcastle they closed many areas to fishing and made it a marine park, now they want to put experimental wind turbines in the middle of the marine park

Ideology and common sense rarely match
 
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