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The future of energy generation and storage

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Smurf1976 said:
Also worth noting is that there's a massive hydro resource in PNG not being used for anything.
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Sounds good, but the PNG government hasn't exactly been politically stable or corruption free. Could be some problems there down the track.
 
SirRumpole said:
Sounds good, but the PNG government hasn't exactly been politically stable or corruption free. Could be some problems there down the track.
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This was mooted years ago and the cable was ready to be laid over to the pointy bit ontop QLD and along came some glitch in the system
 
SirRumpole said:
Sounds good, but the PNG government hasn't exactly been politically stable or corruption free. Could be some problems there down the track.
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True but it comes down to the old risk versus reward. There's a rather big "prize" at stake with this one and with a sensible approach could benefit both countries greatly.

It's a massive project compared to PNG's present electrical infrastructure though. They've presently got about 200 MW of installed hydro capacity and another 100 MW of oil / gas fired generation. Meanwhile there's over 4000 MW (base load capacity) of hydro potential presently not being used and that's where the opportunity arises.
 
Putting this into perspective, for next summer we need:

1500 MW in total additional supply between Vic and SA. This assumes everything works 100% perfectly so is a somewhat risky strategy.

At least 550 MW of that must be located in SA due to transmission constraints. The rest can be in either Vic or SA (but not anywhere else, again due to transmission constraints).

If we wanted to be able to cope with just one large supply source failure then we need to change those numbers to 2100 MW in total with not less than 800 MW of that in SA.

If we wanted to be able to cope with two failures, and that would be the normally desired approach that an engineer would choose, then we need to increase that to 2650 MW in total with not less than 1000 MW of that in SA and at least a small amount of it in Vic.

So there's no chance that a small pumped hydro station is a total solution even if, hypothetically, we could get it built in time. Likewise a few diesel generators or gas turbines aren't going to do it either.

Long term we need a permanent solution but in the short term the options are realistically limited to using plant that already exists. So what are the options there:

Northern (SA, coal) is 540 MW and to my understanding is just sitting there. The next door Playford B station is being demolished, it's too far gone to contemplate using it now, but to my understanding Northern is still fully intact. Fuel is low grade black coal from Leigh Creek (about 250 km from the power station) hauled by rail.

Pelican Point (SA, gas) has half the plant (an additional 239 MW) not being used. All it needs to get it running is to sort out purely administrative matters - make some gas available, make it financially viable to run the plant and so on.

Anglesea (Vic, coal) was mothballed and to my understanding is still intact (not absolutely certain on that but to my understanding it is). It's a 160 MW plant using brown coal from a mine right next to the power station. A notable point is that it's a separate mine to that supplying anything else, so adds some supply security should some disaster occur at a mine, and that CO2 emissions from this plant are 22% lower per unit of output than they are from Hazelwood power station (also in Vic).

Hazelwood (Vic, coal) is the big one with a capacity of 1600 MW and about to close at the end of next month. It's the most polluting plant in the grid and pretty much worn out but to be blunt we're stuffed without it producing at least some power. Spending $140 million would keep it going for another 10 - 15 years and looks like the best available option, along with doing all of the others I've mentioned, until we can actually get something else built.

Put that lot back into service and all up there's 2539 MW with 779 MW of that in SA. So it comes close to providing a reliable supply but doesn't create a surplus as such.

If it were up to me then I'd be getting them going and, noting that they'll all have a realistic remaining lifespan of 10 - 15 years*, ensuring we get a proper transition underway with alternatives actually built in the available time.

*In Northern's case that assumes only running for 6 months of the year, the issue being that there's not much cheaply mineable coal left. There's plenty as such but most would cost too much to get at so that's a constraint so far as we need to keep the cost low. But intermittent running, when it's actually needed, until the end of next decade is plenty of time to get something else built if we make an effort.

Failing that, those in Vic or SA could consider spending next summer in Qld, NT, WA or Tas all of which have reliable power. NSW is on the edge and heading the same way as Vic and SA so not the best choice.

Or you could just hope that it's always windy when it's hot. Trouble is that typically isn't the case.

My personal expectation is that once a couple of decent failures occur in Vic then that state will end up with out right rationing. Vic governments have traditionally been keener on that approach than elsewhere so quite likely it will happen again. That's just speculation though - I guess someone will look at the politics and decide which is the least bad option politically.
 
So what are they going to do with Hazlewood when it shuts ? Demolish it ?

It seems an opportunity for a government to buy it back at a bargain price. At least there should be some laws requiring the hardware to be left in place so it can be reactivated by a new owner.
 
SirRumpole said:
So what are they going to do with Hazlewood when it shuts ? Demolish it ?
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Ultimately that's the plan.

No chance it will be a spectacular "implosion" type demolition (apart possibly from the 8 stacks) but they seem to be planning to clear the site as such in due course.

Biggest problem they'll likely have will be with asbestos and there's plenty of that. They've removed some over the years but there's still plenty there.
 
The thing that amazes me, is that they are contemplating shutting and demolishing 1600MW of generation, when they have had power disruptions because of inadequate generation.
So how much will it cost to replace the lost generation, from memory it costs about a million dollars per megawatt, then you have still got the inadequate generation problem, as it it only replacing what was demolished.
Victoria and South Australia certainly seem to need a reality check.
The saving grace, may be all the industry, shutting down.lol
 
sptrawler said:
Victoria and South Australia certainly seem to need a reality check.
The saving grace, may be all the industry, shutting down.lol
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Perhaps they don't need all that power now Ford, Toyota and Holden are shutting down, plus all the allied industries?

Malcolm, Pyne, Abetz, Bishop, etc should be rather satisfied all those manufacturing and power generation nurseries of unionism are destroyed by taking the floor from underneath the dirty working class who weren't raised in apartments of Vaucluse on the North Shore of Sydney.
 

Never fear, there is sure to be a negative gearing led recovery .
 
Amazing to see the Vic government "demanding" answers for something that didn't even eventuate.

Either they really don't grasp what's happening or they're intentionally playing dumb but they're going to be in for one hell of a shock next Summer if it's the former and will have their spin doctors working some pretty serious overtime if it's the latter.
 
Looks like the wheels are starting to fall off at Hazelwood now.

Plant has 8 completely separate generating units. In simple terms that means there's 8 boilers with 8 sets of everything needed to make them run (coal handling etc) and each boiler is coupled to its own turbine and alternator ("generator"). So 8 sets of everything and they're all independent of each other apart from some common bits like the mine itself.

Go back a few months and it was pretty normal to have all 8 units in full production all at once. So that's 1600 MW (8 x 200 MW).

Then Unit 3 had a problem and was off for quite some time including when the closure announcement occurred. At that time most of the rest were de-rated such that overall capacity became about 1400 MW if all 8 units were running.

Fast forward to right now and only 6 units are running and between them they're producing 990 MW each. Units 3 & 7 are off, Unit 8 is struggling along at 129 MW (that has happened quite a bit lately) and the rest are doing 160 - 181 MW each. It's at 990 MW for the station as a whole or 62% of its rated capacity.

So it's not going well. No surprise there since with closure now only just over 5 weeks away spending anything significant on maintenance won't be happening at this point. Go forward another couple of weeks and even a minor issue won't be worth fixing.

Power supply and environmental issues aside, it's sad to see what was once an engineering masterpiece with such a massive history behind it all now being run into the ground and falling into a heap.

Even sadder when you consider that it represents an era when Australia took on massive projects and made them work. Hazelwood was never straightforward technically, there were problems making it happen right from the start, but we overcame them all and made it happen (and the SECV had to invent what's known as "cold combustion" to make it all work - now there's a term sure to confuse just about anyone).

Now in 2017 we're seemingly unable to build anything to replace it. Not even with off the shelf technology can we get ourselves organised enough to make it happen. So sad.

*Cold combustion - in short the problem is that the coal at Morwell has some rather unique and nasty properties which cause the ash to turn into something not far off concrete if burned conventionally and that's a huge problem. The solution was to burn the coal at a lower temperature than what it naturally burns at but without resulting in incomplete combustion as would normally occur under such a scenario. That all comes down to how the coal and air is mixed in the boiler and how that effects the driving off of water and the actual combustion but it took a lot of scientific effort within the SECV to come up with something that worked at the time.
 
It really isn't funny, the reality is, if we can't supply power reliably and at a reasonable cost our industry will go, this will result in a drop in living standards.
Well let's be honest it is already happening, wages and conditions are being squeezed, superannuation is being squeezed, retail is being squeezed.
The welfare bill is spiralling and no one can slow it, so unless someone finds batteries for the magic wand, we are in deep ****. IMO
 
Smurf1976 said:
Now in 2017 we're seemingly unable to build anything to replace it. Not even with off the shelf technology can we get ourselves organised enough to make it happen. So sad.
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I posted an article in the Trump thread that said that Kodak could not build a digital camera these days because the skills to do it have gone elsewhere.

Globalisation is a great thing, not.
 
SirRumpole said:
I posted an article in the Trump thread that said that Kodak could not build a digital camera these days because the skills to do it have gone elsewhere.
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In the context of the power industry we've still got the skill base in Tas, being sustained by doing contract work for anyone who's willing to pay and that includes international as well as Australian clients. List of some projects in recent years (including some local ones) is here: http://www.entura.com.au/projects/

On the subject of Entura and specifically pumped hydro development, see this: http://www.entura.com.au/overcoming-the-barriers-to-pumped-storage-hydropower/
 
nioka said:
Smurf, You may like to comment on "http://vsunenergy.com.au." and how it may be a help to the SA problems.
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As a technology there's nothing wrong with it. Stores energy and it works.

From an economic perspective though when it comes to the scale that's required in SA then pumped hydro kills anything based on batteries economically. The lifespan difference and inherent simplicity are the underlying reasons for that. Plus rotating machines (eg hydro turbines) naturally provide inertia to the grid which other means struggle to do (though it's not impossible).

Where we might see big battery systems used in significant numbers is if nothing else is done. If you've got an office or any other situation where your economic loss in the event of a blackout is high relative to the amount of electricity actually consumed then backing up your power supply is a relatively cheap form of insurance against a potentially larger loss. If it only takes one or two blackouts to make having backup the cheaper option then a rational business owner would go down that track unless there's a physical constraint preventing it (eg your're in the CBD and there's simply nowhere to put the equipment).

That approach doesn't work for things like big factories where electricity itself is a major input but it sure does apply to situations where electricity is a minor business input but a critical enabler of everything else you do.

Share trading would be one such example for those who day trade or otherwise need constant access to the markets. Cost of power is trivial and the cost of backing it up isn't much either when compared to the potential financial loss if power fails. Different story when power is 25% of your business costs and a backup would cost $1 billion or more (and that's exactly the case for some energy-intensive manufacturing).
 
nioka said:
Smurf, You may like to comment on "http://vsunenergy.com.au." and how it may be a help to the SA problems.
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I should add that there's a company looking at a reasonably large battery system in SA. That would be a "power station", well a storage system, as such taking energy in and out of the grid and not directly associated with any specific load.

My personal view is that pumped hydro is a better option in terms of longevity (pretty much forever versus the limited life of any battery) and in that it involves big rotating machines with their inherent inertia (a good thing for grid stability) but someone is looking at doing it with some seriously big batteries.

Obviously I'll change my view if they can get the cost down to a point that makes it the better option over a long time period (noting that they'll have to replace everything several times to get comparable life to hydro) but that remains to be seen.
 
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