Wind Generation and the Electricity Grid

[drron]

Very windy in Florida at the moment. I read that renewables power the panhandle state to the extent of 2%. Base load provided by mainly gas and nuclear. The renewables are mostly biomass.

Many homes out of power due to fallen powerlines. But the entire state in a blackout?. Nope.

And despite the fears of the alternate crowd it was nuclear power that kept the lights on during and after Harvey.In fact the only generators to keep going-
Utility crews stream into Florida for hurricane payday, adventure

So maybe the time is right to consider nuclear options in Australia.
This fellow is a total believer in AGW but also sees that wind is not the answer-
The future of energy isn’t fossil fuels or renewables, it’s nuclear fusion

So rather than throwing money at unreliable wind generation in subsidies maybe we should be funding this research.

 

[Moody]

Well here's a turn up for the books - something that Moody and drron agree on .... at least partially.

If the rabid right are so offended by the sight of wind turbines and the thought of all the birds who meet an untimely end, then I agree - build a massive nuclear plant in each capital city. We have a plentiful supply of fuel, and plenty of stable sites suitable for waste storage.

Basically anything is better than coal-based power plants that kill more people per month globally than Chernobyl ever will.

 

[cove]

I now look forward to receiving power bills seeing we took the initiative on LED and solar on all of our buildings.
The idea that we can dump baseload power stations is quite ridiculous. If we want blackouts it will get rid of many businesses that need reliable and fair priced electricity. Those businesses employ millions in Australia.

 

[drron]

Actualy Moody that has been my opinion all along.The problem is wind is not the answer.Unreliable and expensive.It is also going to end up a major pollution problem when turbines reach the end of their days.Already a major pollution problem in China with the production of niobium-an essential part of a wind turbine.
On top of that more people have died in wind farm accidents than nuclear generator accidents.

 

[cove]

I just hope our politicians stop the closing of base load power stations. You need to have fairly priced coal or gas powered generators to avoid blackouts.

 

[wandering_fred]

From the consumers point of view, the current situation is a problem. The generators wish to make more money. Some would call it maximizing the return on the investment, others perhaps would call it corporate greed. Given the current rate of return on capital, they are unwilling to build anything in the way of generation. The lack of generation potentially raises the price of electricity. They win on both sides. And why in many countries there are serious regulatory climates for monopolies/industries with limited entry possibilities.

This is perhaps a reason to support smaller and more local generation owned by the government or co-operatives where a more modest return is considered acceptable.

Previous topic: The Denmark wind farm now appears to be generating on the same scale as the Albany farm. If there were reporting faults which were explored as a result of my query, I suspect AEMO would never say so.

Just wandering

Fred

 

[cove]

I can see you have recently lost your head w_f. Was that a wind farm that caused it?

 

[SFSC]

And despite the fears of the alternate crowd it was nuclear power that kept the lights on during and after Harvey.In fact the only generators to keep going-
Utility crews stream into Florida for hurricane payday, adventure

So maybe the time is right to consider nuclear options in Australia.
This fellow is a total believer in AGW but also sees that wind is not the answer-
The future of energy isn’t fossil fuels or renewables, it’s nuclear fusion

So rather than throwing money at unreliable wind generation in subsidies maybe we should be funding this research.

There is a place for any generating technology providing it works, is cost effective, risks can be managed and funds to provide for any decommissioning costs can be set aside during the service life of the plant. A nuke or two would provide helpful rotating inertia and voltage control to the system.

 

[drron]

France has >70% nuclear generation and has the lowest electricity prices in Europe apart from a couple of former Eastern European countries relying on coal but still with a >30% contribution from nuclear.France is also the largest nett exporter of electricity in the world.

 

[Moody]

But let me make myself perfectly clear .... there are financial factors (i.e. - efficiencies and competition in the generation, distribution and retailing of energy), and there are environmental factors (i.e. - minimising the harm to the plant and therefore ourselves*).

The current shambolic, incompetent and corrupt coalition of the mentally and morally challenged are failing to address either challenge. Not too surprising - their only policy is ..... ummmm .... actually I don't think they have one. They have lots of them. Mostly contradictory. Figures.

Ask yourself this - why are rooftop solar panels so popular in Australia when by their very nature, they can't possibly supply power 24x7?

 

[Quickstatus]

Ask yourself this - why are rooftop solar panels so popular in Australia when by their very nature, they can't possibly supply power 24x7?

It's an interesting but true observation. I put it in the same basket as Diet Coke with a large Big Mac meal.

Big McMansions electricity guzzlers are popular too and so are big SUVs.

I wonder what proportion of houses with solar panels are McMansions who have double garages filled with large SUVsand when the family goes to McDonalds they have a large Big Mac meal with a Diet Coke.

Friends have exactly the above. After all you need a massive roof to significantly reduce your electricity bill with solar panels

To the question
1)large net feed in tariff
2) artificial rising electricity prices in a distorted market
3) dodgy accounting making the solar panel numbers look good by solar panel vendors
4)look at me I'm environmental

Interestingly the people who can afford solar panels are not the ones who can't afford electricity price rises

 

[Moody]

Going to your actual answers (rather than the unnecessary and contradictory social commentary)

1) The generous FITs are long gone. They are now less than a third of the electricity retail rates.
2) Yeah - Tony and his Coalition Cronies (TM) have ensured that the market is truly underinvested and gamed to the max.
3) Certainly a long term investment - as your footnote alludes to - but not as long as it used to be thanks to the punishing electricity prices
4) There are no environmentalists here, that's for sure. Or economic geniuses it seems ....

But you have missed my point entirely. You never will achieve 100% renewable energy until the storage technology reaches a new level. But does that mean that solar/wind/wave technology is pointless, and coal is the only answer? [That's known as a rhetorical question.]

 

[Quickstatus]

Going to your actual answers (rather than the unnecessary and contradictory social commentary)

1) The generous FITs are long gone. They are now less than a third of the electricity retail rates.
2) Yeah - Tony and his Coalition Cronies (TM) have ensured that the market is truly underinvested and gamed to the max.
3) Certainly a long term investment - as your footnote alludes to - but not as long as it used to be thanks to the punishing electricity prices
4) There are no environmentalists here, that's for sure. Or economic geniuses it seems ....

But you have missed my point entirely. You never will achieve 100% renewable energy until the storage technology reaches a new level. But does that mean that solar/wind/wave technology is pointless, and coal is the only answer? [That's known as a rhetorical question.]

But
1)The explosion in solar panels started with the very generous net feed in tariffs. But prices are artificially inflated to make solar more attractive. So those with $$$ just bring forward expenditure. Those without $$$ can't
2)Its gamed to the max because the distortion was in grossly favour of renewables. No one will invest in coal because its been politically demonised and companies and banks/shareholders are being pressured by activists to eschew coal
3)Even now as a long term investment the numbers dont stack up unless you believe the solar industry hype. The industry erroneously calls it an investment. However an investment is never a good investment if you cannot redeem the principal. In fact its not an investment at all.
4)Pretend environmentalists. Like a certain ex vice president

I feel better drinking diet coke especially after a sizable pasta dinner. The social commentary is apt because it neatly describes the hypocrisy found in a significant number of solar panel installations. Not all though - some people really do try to reduce their consumption of resources.

 

[Quickstatus]

Maybe it's full of hot air:
UN climate reports are increasingly unreadable

Write it in gobbledygook and everyone will think the information is written by experts.

Interestingly a lot of what's in the IPCC reports are a distillation of negotiations between various parties including scientists and government officials. To ensure accuracy? - naturally!

 

[Moody]

Maybe it's full of hot air:
UN climate reports are increasingly unreadable

Write it in gobbledygook and everyone will think the information is written by experts.

"Gobbledygook" to the DFO's whose lips move while they read The Australian? Perhaps ...... but I see they are thinking of getting expert writers to dumb the next report down a bit more.

Interestingly a lot of what's in the IPCC reports are a distillation of negotiations between various parties including scientists and government officials. To ensure accuracy? - naturally!

No - to try and reach consensus. There are always going to be opinions and models at the fringe, and unscrupulous operators will use them to "prove" that the entirety of the climate scientists fraternity are in on one big conspiracy theory. Whereas the real conspiracy is amongst greedy and myopically right-wing politicians and their sycophants, most of whom probably realise that climate change is real - they just don't care but don't want to admit that.

 

[drron]

The argument we are having re wind power has really little to do with the science of climate change but the physics of wind generation.The Greens and most politicians do not understand that science.In the words of Michael Shellenberger,former renewables advisor to Obama,the wind and solar experiment has failed.If you really believe in renewables nuclear is the only way to go.
Here is one explanation-
A small country with big ideas to get rid of fossil fuels
There are quite a few presentations here re renewables and are worth watching.
It changed the subject on me.Hopefully here is the nuclear talk-
How fear of nuclear power is hurting the environment

 

[whatmeworry]

Meanwhile while our gas prices increase, ExxonMobil keeps giving away our LNG and probably not paying tax.

India has won a price cut on a 20-year liquefied natural gas (LNG) deal with global giant ExxonMobil Corp in a rare contract renegotiation, a bad sign for producers in a heavily oversupplied global market.

In a trade-off for ExxonMobil, India’s Petronet LNG will increase its volumes from the Gorgon LNG project in Australia by an extra 1 million tonnes a year to about 2.5 million tonnes a year, but at cheaper rates than initially agreed in 2009.

Long-term contracts are rarely revised in the LNG market, and for a big producer to cave in shows how supply from new plants in Australia and the United States over the past two years has transformed the market, analysts said.

“This trend is overall a negative for sellers, as they are forced to provide more flexibility to buyers’ needs to maintain their markets,” said Saul Kavonic, an analyst with energy consultants Wood Mackenzie.

As Australian prices rise, Exxon slashes price for Australian gas exported to India - The AIM Network

 

[wandering_fred]

Until someone can justify the finances for building a pipeline/transmission line from WA to the eastern states, the eastern states' prices will reflect the energy isolation/poor energy decisions that the various governments have made.

Maybe the export terminals on the east coast should consider becoming import terminals as well?

Not that WA doesn't have its own problems. Seems I can't change (or add another) the PV controllers (for the roof top solar PV panels) without losing the ability to upload surplus energy to the grid (or at least get paid for the privilege which is about $0.077/unit).

Just wandering

Fred

 

[drron]

Meanwhile while our gas prices increase, ExxonMobil keeps giving away our LNG and probably not paying tax.



As Australian prices rise, Exxon slashes price for Australian gas exported to India - The AIM Network

You do realise that AGL was the Australian gaslight company.Why do you think it wants to close it's coal fired power stations?

 

[Moody]

The argument we are having re wind power has really little to do with the science of climate change but the physics of wind generation.The Greens and most politicians do not understand that science.In the words of Michael Shellenberger,former renewables advisor to Obama,the wind and solar experiment has failed.If you really believe in renewables nuclear is the only way to go.
Here is one explanation-
A small country with big ideas to get rid of fossil fuels

Thanks for that drron - it underlines perfectly that you can achieve a clean energy future if you ignore the lobbyists and vested interests who make their blood money out of selling pollution at the highest possible price. No mention of nuclear energy in this little TED talk - did you link to the wrong one? Though please feel assured that I haven't flipped on you - nuclear energy to fill in the renewbles "gap" would be a far, far better thing than killer coal-powered stations we have today.