The future of energy generation and storage

Tamar Valley combined cycle gas turbine plant in Tasmania is planned to be started up tomorrow and placed in base load service for an extended period (no date is set but it's likely to be well into 2018).

The reason is a purely commercial decision. Tasmania doesn't have a problem supplying power without it under present circumstances but in view of gas and electricity prices in Victoria it's expected to be profitable hence being done.

The practical effect is that Tas will supply more power to Vic than would otherwise have been the case. There's some complexity there in how that comes about, since Basslink can be fully loaded Tas to Vic during the Summer peaks with or without running Tamar Valley CCGT, but it will increase average northbound flow. Tamar Valley CCGT is significantly more fuel efficient than any gas-fired plant in Vic or SA so has an advantage over others due to that.

In other happenings in the power industry, Delta Electricity is planning to build a 45 MW solar farm next to the existing 1320 MW Vales Point coal-fired power station in NSW. They've engaged Entura (Hydro Tas) on a commercial basis to progress the engineering of the project and are presently planning to start construction next year. It's not huge obviously but it's another step.

Turnbull tries to keep Liddell open.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-...-keep-liddell-coal-power-station-open/8874874

SirRumpole said:

Turnbull tries to keep Liddell open.

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He'll need a lot of luck to make that work.

Liddell is akin to an elderly person reliant on a walking frame to get about and an assortment of drugs to keep them alive. They might be around 5 years from now but 10 is seriously pushing it. There's a fair bit of speculation that it might not even make it to 2022 given how it's going at the moment and in the recent past. If it does then it'll be like the marathon runner who falls over the finish line and collapses in a heap, it's not going to run another few km just for fun that's for sure.

Liddell is 46 years old now and from an engineering perspective pretty much at end of life. Much the same problems that Hazelwood had in a technical sense and would cost serious $ to properly fix. The plant has officially been de-rated from 2000 MW to 1800 MW but struggles to get much over 1600 MW and then only if all 4 units are actually running. Suffice to say the load shedding in NSW earlier this year was directly because Liddell fell in a heap on those days.

Wallerawang (1000 MW) was in better shape. Newer, two units commissioned in 1976 and 1980, and in overall better condition. It has been permanently closed however.

Redbank was much smaller (150 MW) but the newest coal-fired plant in NSW. It too has been closed.

Munmorah is undergoing demolition but had 2 x 350 MW units not run since about 1990 and in good shape since they were commissioned in 1967 so hadn't had a huge amount of use. They would have needed new emissions controls fitted to meet modern standards but it could have been done. Too late now though since the stacks have been blown up and the rest is being demolished along with the other two units that were still running until a few years ago.

Smithfield was a gas-fired plant (171) MW and closed just a few weeks ago. Another one gone in NSW.

So roughly the same amount of capacity as Liddell has been scrapped in NSW in recent years, all of it in better shape than Liddell is. Now there's panic and trying to keep Liddell open.

From that ABC report I note it mentions imminent problems in Vic and SA this coming Summer.

It's the old practice of slowly changing the language. Everyone was trying to say it would be OK just a few months ago but now there's warnings of blackouts. No surprise there, it's just the old practice of slowly changing the language and letting the bad news out to the masses.

Whether or not Vic has a problem this Summer really does depend on the weather. If it's hot and still then there's a problem. But if there's no heatwave, or it's windy when it does get hot, then the system will scrape through so long as nothing breaks. It's a gamble.

Smurf1976 said:

He'll need a lot of luck to make that work.

Liddell is akin to an elderly person reliant on a walking frame to get about and an assortment of drugs to keep them alive. .

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The owners are an Aged Care home getting every penny out of the old girl before she keels over?

The way things are going over East, the major power suppliers, will be paid to put in plant. lol

What a mess we have made of things, from one of the cheapest Countries for electricity to one of the dearest, in such a short period of time.
We are certainly doing a great job, of screwing a Country, but don't worry we will sort out gay marriage, maybe.

sptrawler said:

We are certainly doing a great job, of screwing a Country.

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Yep, when governments handed over to private companies the rights to an essential service things headed downhill fast.

Governments should accept that it's their responsibility to provide essential services and go back to building and running generation and distribution.

SirRumpole said:

Yep, when governments handed over to private companies the rights to an essential service things headed downhill fast.

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Hazlewood - sold by Liberal Premier Jeff Kennett
Liddell - sold by Liberal Premier Mike Baird

And I keep hearing that idiot Turnbull going on about "ideological" blunders by the Labor Party, what a hypocrite.

SirRumpole said:

Hazlewood - sold by Liberal Premier Jeff Kennett
Liddell - sold by Liberal Premier Mike Baird

And I keep hearing that idiot Turnbull going on about "ideological" blunders by the Labor Party, what a hypocrite.

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Stupidity doesn't appear to be party specific.
Labor in S.A and Victoria allowed the power stations to be knocked over, if they were worried they could have bought them and kept them running.
It was only one post earlier, you were suggesting just that, they could have got them for a song, then run them as a State enterprise.
But that would have been too smart, better to let everyone believe they are not needed and sell the Labor/Green dream.

Tisme said:

The owners are an Aged Care home getting every penny out of the old girl before she keels over?

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I don't doubt the technical competence of the owners (AGL) but ultimately Liddell is already at the point where it's worn out and struggling to keep going.

They did a patch up last year but still struggled to keep it going when the weather got hot. Half the plant failed outright, the other half couldn't get up to full capacity, and load shedding in NSW was the result.

Right now Liddell is three quarters operational as such. Of the 3 (of 4) units operating they're running at 84% of capacity and that's as hard as they're able to push it really.

Going forward unit 2 (idle at present) will run again yes but others will have outages. And there's no chance they'll push it up to full output even in an emergency. It just can't get there and if it did then there's a fair chance of bad things happening. It's not in good shape.

It's not the only one in that situation. Torrens Island A (SA, 4 x 120 MW) has similar problems and has also been patched up. It also wasn't fully operational during the load shedding last Summer although the individual units can and do still reach full capacity when they're running. Just don't count on it being reliable (a point that AGL themselves have noted publicly to the point that they're not confident they'll ever get the whole Torrens Island station up to full capacity all at once ever again).

There's also some unconfirmed but widespread rumours that another significant power station in NSW / Vic / SA (I'm intentionally not naming it) has much the same problems rapidly approaching and that a Hazelwood style rapid exit is a plausible outcome.

So far as major plant overhauls and maintenance are concerned, well suffice to say that Snowy and Hydro Tas are really the only two that actually do complete plant overhauls and bring everything up to "like new" condition on a routine basis. The others tend to be shorter outages to meet regulatory requirements (inspection of pressure vessels etc) or fixing things once they break. That said, at least AGL do seem to have a pretty good idea as to the condition of their plants and are willing to make that information public.

Engie are going to do some major works at Loy Yang B to get a bit more capacity out of it but that's about it really so far as that sort of thing is concerned.

Smurf1976 said:

I don't doubt the technical competence of the owners (AGL) but ultimately Liddell is already at the point where it's worn out and struggling to keep going.

They did a patch up last year but still struggled to keep it going when the weather got hot. Half the plant failed outright, the other half couldn't get up to full capacity, and load shedding in NSW was the result.

Right now Liddell is three quarters operational as such. Of the 3 (of 4) units operating they're running at 84% of capacity and that's as hard as they're able to push it really.

Going forward unit 2 (idle at present) will run again yes but others will have outages. And there's no chance they'll push it up to full output even in an emergency. It just can't get there and if it did then there's a fair chance of bad things happening. It's not in good shape.

It's not the only one in that situation. Torrens Island A (SA, 4 x 120 MW) has similar problems and has also been patched up. It also wasn't fully operational during the load shedding last Summer although the individual units can and do still reach full capacity when they're running. Just don't count on it being reliable (a point that AGL themselves have noted publicly to the point that they're not confident they'll ever get the whole Torrens Island station up to full capacity all at once ever again).

There's also some unconfirmed but widespread rumours that another significant power station in NSW / Vic / SA (I'm intentionally not naming it) has much the same problems rapidly approaching and that a Hazelwood style rapid exit is a plausible outcome.

So far as major plant overhauls and maintenance are concerned, well suffice to say that Snowy and Hydro Tas are really the only two that actually do complete plant overhauls and bring everything up to "like new" condition on a routine basis. The others tend to be shorter outages to meet regulatory requirements (inspection of pressure vessels etc) or fixing things once they break. That said, at least AGL do seem to have a pretty good idea as to the condition of their plants and are willing to make that information public.

Engie are going to do some major works at Loy Yang B to get a bit more capacity out of it but that's about it really so far as that sort of thing is concerned.

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As you said a while back smurph, life is going to get interesting and expensive, on the East Coast.
It sounds as though a bit of panic is setting in, as the severity of the situation, starts to dawn on the pollies.
The power companies don't appear to care, I also guess, they can only win from any crisis.

sptrawler said:

Stupidity doesn't appear to be party specific.

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Liberals are know it all meddlers whereas Labor tends to rely on the advice of department heads and the like.

There's also a difference in the approach to financial management. Labor tends to openly borrow money. Liberal tends to raid internal accounts, delay things are so on and hides the deficit. The net effect is much the same, all that differs is visible (Labor) versus hidden (Liberal).

Those are the main differences I've observed and I've seen enough to know.

sptrawler said:

As you said a while back smurph, life is going to get interesting and expensive

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Yep.

I've said plenty about it on this forum well before it became mainstream news. I'm no genius but it's not exactly rocket science to add up the capacity of all generating plant, compare that to consumption and realise it's not going to work.

Thankfully WA, NT, Tas and for the short term at least Qld are in decent shape but things aren't going to go too well in Vic and SA that's for sure and there's not a lot of hope to fix it in NSW either before the clock runs out.

QLd govt has secured a deal with Shell to provide gas to an idle 385MW station (that's right QLD has excess capacity) Swanbank E, to bolster summer load.

Maybe everyone is getting ahead of themselves, or maybe just a speed bump, on the highway of life.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-07/battery-scheme-under-the-spotlight/8883330

It's o.k to replace stuff, when there isn't many with it, i wonder what will happen in a couple of years if the gear isn't compatible?
Maybe this is a bellwether.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-05-05/sa-power-customers-to-miss-compensation/8499414

Tisme said:

QLd govt has secured a deal with Shell to provide gas to an idle 385MW station (that's right QLD has excess capacity) Swanbank E, to bolster summer load.

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Qld's strategy has their state-owned generation pursuing volume rather than price. No doubt that's not impressing their privately owned rivals but it's keeping prices a bit lower and results in Qld supplying quite a lot into NSW.

Qld and Tas are both propping up NSW, Vic and SA so far peak generating capacity is concerned although there's a limit to how far that can really go given the limits of transmission between states.

As with any dependency, have no doubt that the suppliers won't be losing money in the long run.

Smurf1976 said:

Qld's strategy has their state-owned generation pursuing volume rather than price. No doubt that's not impressing their privately owned rivals but it's keeping prices a bit lower and results in Qld supplying quite a lot into NSW.

Qld and Tas are both propping up NSW, Vic and SA so far peak generating capacity is concerned although there's a limit to how far that can really go given the limits of transmission between states.

As with any dependency, have no doubt that the suppliers won't be losing money in the long run.

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Qld and Tassie are going to be in the box seat, this summer, they should make a killing. I suppose Tassie is keeping dam storage levels high, in preparation.

Smurf1976 said:

Qld's strategy has their state-owned generation pursuing volume rather than price. No doubt that's not impressing their privately owned rivals but it's keeping prices a bit lower and results in Qld supplying quite a lot into NSW.

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Unless things have changed since I was involved in the transfer of the PPAs to the government generators, the volume should not be an issue as the PPAs determine the return to the private generators, not the price or the volume and, in fact, they will be happy not to run the generators hard to save on the R&M costs.

At last a glimmer of intelligence in South Australian politics.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...a/news-story/838c139b13595d1cfe8699e9fda82b6d

Country Lad said:

Unless things have changed since I was involved in the transfer of the PPAs to the government generators, the volume should not be an issue as the PPAs determine the return to the private generators, not the price or the volume and, in fact, they will be happy not to run the generators hard to save on the R&M costs.

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I don't know the details of those arrangements but so far as daily operations are concerned, the Qld government generators certainly seem to be pursuing a policy of maximising volume (regardless of price) at the moment. That's among the most noticeable changes in the overall market in recent terms along with the various closures and the impact of higher gas prices.

On another matter, well it's spring and it seems that people are starting to receive the inevitable huge power bills due to heating over winter. Got a call from a friend last week, bill over $1100, and that's in Tas with most of that consumption for heating at 16 cents / kWh (that's 24 hours supply not off-peak) and the rest for general power at 26c. God only knows how those living in SA paying around 40c are coping - shivering in the dark presumably.

All this isn't much of an issue for those who live in the CBD of a capital city in an apartment. A very long way down the list to be cut off if there's a supply shortage and if they're at work all day then consumption and cost won't be that much. At the other end of the scale, it's a nightmare come true for larger families living in the suburbs or for those (elderly etc) who spend a lot of time at home and need to keep warm. First to be cut off when the inevitable happens in Vic and SA (and soon to be NSW) and huge bills too.

Plus of course it's bad for businesses - firstly due to higher direct costs and secondly because it's siphoning off money that consumers would otherwise spend on whatever and which now goes into paying for power.

At this point there's no quick fix for the problems unfortunately.

Smurf1976 said:

At the other end of the scale, it's a nightmare come true for larger families living in the suburbs or for those (elderly etc) who spend a lot of time at home and need to keep warm. First to be cut off when the inevitable happens in Vic and SA (and soon to be NSW) and huge bills too.

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Fortunately it's been an unseasonably warm summer, I managed to reduce my consumption by 11% from last year, and my bill by about $300.