South Australia survived the big scary sunny day yesterday, but had to shut off solar power and throw all those sacred green electrons into a thousand open circuits.
Yet again, another spooky voltage spike appeared, suddenly leaping from 245 to 257 volts in less than three minutes and shaking down any impertinent solar panels. That was at 10am. From then on, despite the growing sunlight, the combined solar output of South Australia stayed flat at around 1.2GW. Compare this to last week — before the safety cord to Victoria broke — then, solar generation was peaking at 2.1 GW. So the great renewable wonderland is managing to keep the lights on, but nearly a billion watts of solar power is sitting uselessly on rooftops and in fields every sunny day at lunch time.
This is not the cheap and efficient golden path to the future, but the Bolshevik elephant that eats your retirement plans. Despite the oversupply of unreliable generation, yesterday the state was using fossil fuels to supply between 20% and 80% of their electricity.
Mark Jessop recorded the voltage and commented: “Lovely sunny day here in islanded SA, which of course means @SAPowerNetworks has bumped up the voltage again.“
Voltage spikes in SA Nov 2022, graph Mark Jessop
The question-of-the-day is whether South Australia Power Network (SAPN) is deliberately using voltage spikes to trip off household solar panel inverters, thus stopping the world-saving-photovoltaics from flooding the grid with electricity the system can’t handle. It would be a brutal and rather desperate cowboy tool for grid management. Shame about the surge hitting all those other appliances, eh? But it’s just a little sacrifice on the road to perfect weather.
The voltage spike could be due to many solar panels suddenly ramping up production, like, say, a cloud bank lifted off Adelaide at 9.51?
For the next four hours after the spike, as the sunlight peaked for the day, the solar production stayed flat seemingly “capped” at 1.2GW. Uncanny how the grid solar farms (red) maintained a constant output…
Two years ago, the SA Government knew they were headed for the deep belly of the Duck Curve, where solar midday over-supply threatens grid stability. Rather than stopping people adding more solar panels, the government decided all new solar systems had be able to be remotely disconnected. Naturally this situation, where the owners brain is superceded by a bureaucrat managing a duck was called the Smarter Homes Regulation.
But all the panels installed before Sept 2020 can’t be turned off by the government, and were thus rogue operators that possibly needed to be shaken out with voltage shocks.
South Australia is a forward scout of where Australia will be soon
The big test of South Australia’s “renewable grid” yesterday is like a road test of our renewable future. It showed that without the help of the other states to keep the frequency stable, the massive solar influx at midday is largely unmanageable unless the Minister of Electricity controls your solar panels, and everyone is happy to pay for hi-tech equipment that sits around neutered on a sunny day.
The Australian grid is permanently “Islanded” by virtue of being an island. There is no one to rescue us.
In theory, it would take $90 billion dollars worth of batteries to stabilize the South Australian grid, and that’s only 6% of the national one, so we’re doing a trillion dollar experiment here with no life raft.
Three more days to go! The big interconnector to the rest of the network will not be fixed now until Sunday evening.
For the record, Wednesday was not as sunny and the spooky voltage spike hit a lot later in the day (at 12:40pm)
Voltage spikes in SA Nov 2022, graph Mark Jessop
…
South Australian solar generation was flat before and after. The big bite out of solar production in the morning was a grid solar dropout (in red), not the rooftop PV (in yellow). The solar grid production is clearly not a natural curve.
One hundred years from now Grid controllers will laugh.
I will only vote for a party if it vows to build new coal or nuclear power stations, and keep existing ones going until those new ones are built.
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I was at a preselection event to choose a replacement for a retiring National Party member of NSW House of Reps. Every candidate assured me, I was the only one asking, that they would champion coal, gas and nuclear. That was excellent however the Liberals are in control of the Coalition and they have idiots like Matt Kean who agrees with the madness of Chris Bowen. Kean envisages power lines to everywhere and remote solar and wind farms powering an ever increasing number of EVs. There may be some sensible people out there but they first have to defeat the fools on their own team. Recall that Joel Fitzgibbon, probably the best Labor politicians in recent times, had to resign rather than stay in a party that was in dreamland and determined to destroy Australia in it’s quest to “Save the Planet”.
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Looks like they’ll try to Save the Planet even if it destroys South Australia.
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There’s more to this theme than meets the eye. It’s difficult to quantify the volume of white goods that are prematurely in landfill to further the cause in a transitioning grid.
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Also computer equipment which is sensitive to power surges….surge protectors.
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We could also devolve power generation via ‘micro-generation’. These use temp gradients in the earth and bodies of water, burn LPG, nat-gas, bio-gas, coal, etc. cleanly and produce useful by products. They can be scaled up to 500MW and located where they are needed and unlike the dead-end wind and solar have a minimal footprint, are cheaper and can be ‘hardened’ for natural disasters. Australian invention and patented.
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This piece I wrote in 2016 spoke of many problems with modeling and interactions of setting and the performance or new technologies. https://judithcurry.com/2016/01/06/renewables-and-grid-reliability/
Conventional technology also benefits from considerable experience gained over the years. Power systems are the largest most complex machines in the history of the world. There are many electro-mechanical interactions that can adversely impact the system.…
Rapid changes in generation resources employing a variety of new technologies will create uncertainty. When new technology is introduced across a wide area at a fast pace at levels never seen before, it definitely will heighten the risk that major outages will occur before the problems are identified and fixed. With new technology problems may emerge outside of our existing study areas. In addition our existing modeling methods will be challenged. A model of a 1000 MW coal plant will likely be more accurate than the aggregate of the many models simulating a vast array of solar panels from different production runs, with different technological tweaks and possibly different user settings employed. It’s naïve at best to presume that rapid sweeping changes do not impose special risks.
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As I have said before, politicians need to stop impersonating power systems engineers.
Surely there must be a legal angle worth exploring that unqualified people are making major engineering decisions?
These grossly incompetent decisions by unqualified people result in major economic damage such as high electricity prices, unreliable supply and overvoltage causing equipment damage, not to mention potential loss of life due to power failures and many other consequences?
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Where are the real engineers to speak out against this madness?
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What are the incentives and dis-incentives for engineers to speak out? From a personal perspective, I’m afraid the list of dis-incentives may be much stronger for most.
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Perhaps the “incentive” to speak out is the preservation of Western Civilisation?
And surely engineering ethics demands one speak out when they see incompetent engineering being practiced? Most codes of engineering ethics hold as paramount the welfare of the public and individuals taking responsibility for engineerong decisions, among two of many ethical principles that might be being violated.
If that’s not incentive enough, just sit back and enjoy the collapse.
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When things actually stop working on a large enough scale then actions will be taken. The E.U. is doing a bit of that now. Keep in mind that the people making these bad decisions think they are saving western civilization thereby. Mere warnings have no force at this point.
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Do you really think they would listen. We just get made nonpersons.
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It makes for smug smiles at get togethers. Power engineers appreciate the mess that is unfolding. They spent years avoiding the worst consequence of nasty loads that cause massive swings in demand and light flicker associated with nasty harmonics from large electronic motor drives and inverters.
Fixing problems is what engineers get paid to do. And NutZero is providing an every growing source of big problems to fix. Electrical engineers are one of the main beneficiaries of the madness that the “transition” embodies. If your income relies on madness then why would you want it to change.
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Agreed. Any Engineer who wants a viable career is hamstrung by the national/corporate/state politics.
It isn’t about Engineering any longer. Ideology has sought to overthrow reality.
Gone are the days of maths, facts, or knowledge.
Welcome to the days of Consensus ‘facts’ and Politically Controlled Reality.
Right up until it all collapses under the weight of Reality, ignorance, greed, corruption, and dishonor.
I wonder what all the People will do when their systems stop working because they chose idiocy over knowledge? It isn’t going to be pretty.
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This IS about engineering, Jim, but, not as we know it.
Think: SOCIAL ENGINEERING.
And, as for these “batteries”: Has anyone been keeping any sort of track on “battery fires” lately; especially the really nasty ones of all sizes involving Lithium ion batteries?
ALL batteries generate heat both when charging and discharging. It is the “dose-rate” that determines whether the battery will fail catastrophically or not
Better batteries? These appear to be intangible right now. And never mind the inverters needed to drive a REAL grid.
It is ALL FRAUD. HUGE sums of money, much of it taken from the mug taxpayers at gunpoint. (Ever tried to REALLY NOT pay tax, excise, rates, fees, etc??) are being sloshed around the globe. The trick is to find out who is scooping up the spillage.
The whole “Carbon Credit Caper” is one of the more spectacularly egregious FRAUDS ever perpetrated on the peasantry. It is a “modern” variation on the old medieval “religious Indulgences” caper.
Tell the mugs that they are guilty bastards, BUT, if they “cough up”, things will be cool. Funny how so many folk choose to misinterpret the story in which Jesus kicked over the tables and chased the “money-changers’ from the temple.
That these malicious psychotics still rabbit on about “Carbon” pollution” clearly indicates several things.
They are UTTERLY contemptuous of the “other” and any ability to understand actual chemistry or any science other than the “political” variety.
This ENTIRE rock-show is, and has only ever been about POWER, and not the electrical kind.
Given ALL life on the planet is CARBON-based; “sequestering” Carbon takes on an “interesting” texture. The eco-fascists are high-order DEATH CULTISTS.
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They have all retired…………….There are no more real electrical engineers left.
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There are plenty of “Real” electrical power engineers remaining.
The problem is that the corporations and politicians muzzle them rather than listen to them
Ultimately, the problem is that Voters allow Idiots to ignore Reality in favour of Illusions.
The Engineers didn’t cause the problem. They were ignored by the Politicians and the ignorant voters.
Stupidity has a price, and that, right soon.
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(Scenario)
Judas Priest, you can’t say that. Don’t even think it. We have a Government contract, and how do you think that will go if you even mention that.
But, isn’t it incumbent upon us to tell them.
The don’t want to hear it. If we do tell them, they’ll politely nod their head, and once they turn away, they’ll just mention to their ‘gopher’ to look somewhere else.
Tony.
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Here is the introduction to a carefully written warning from an Engineer and a true gentleman.
Bill wrote this in April 2019. He has stated he is happy to have the full text circulated.
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Licensed/Chartered/Registered Electrical Power Engineers are Employees of Companies and their License is controlled by the State or Government that “authorizes” their status, but not their knowledge, skill, ability, or honour.
Voters have allowed Politicians the Power of destruction over all Chartered Engineers. The Engineers know full well what is wrong, why it is wrong, and what must be done to fix it.
It is NOT the Engineers who are at fault. It is the fault of the Elected Politicians that the Voters have allowed to make decisions they are unqualified to make. Engineers “bend” the laws of physics and reality to produce results. Politicians “bend” the rules of reality for the sake of their own power, wealth, and control.
Until or unless the Voters understand that there exist Hard Limits to physical reality, things will get worse.
Unfortunately, the Education Systems teach more about emotions and fantasies than they teach about Reality.
Do not Blame the Engineers. They know more about this debacle than they are allowed to admit.
Blame the Media who hide reality. Blame the education system that denies reality. Blame the Politicians that grift and grab for money and power at the expense of the People. But in the end, it is The People who have ignorantly chosen emotions over Reality.
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There are lots of engineers out there, but you already know the drill. The moral imperative to save the planet takes priority over everything. How else would Germany, a country with some of the brightest engineering minds, come up with a plan that was always doomed to fail, and did ?.
However, if there is one part of this saga that’s even harder to explain, it’s the continuation of the western countries with their nation destroying RE plans, whilst at the same time watching an explosion of CO2 emissions from China and other developing countries of mind boggling scale. Instead of speaking out in loud protest, they provide hollow moral excuses to the new super emitters and look the other way whilst continuing to pretend to save the world with every ton of emissions saved in the west being offset by an extra 10 tons added by China and the developing world. This is all so crazy it’s impossible to explain the level of blind ignorance or wilful destruction at play here.
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Unqualified people are making major engineering decisions……David, this brings to mind unqualified decisions derived from the top of the energy bureaucracy tree from the office of federal energy minister Chris Bowen. This guys reference manual is ‘Grims Fairy Tales’, promoted by an Orwellian litany of lies and obfuscation. Principals of physics, thermodynamics, electromagnetics and any other true world scientific truths are being applied to Australia’s current ‘energy fantasy grid’ on a daily basis and the result is constant failure and diabolical consequences, a complete diametric opposite result to that constantly promoted by the minister and his army of dwarfs.
The current and potential effects on people, communities, society, industry, business and ultimately our economy are catastropic, yet Bowen and his ilk are unanswerable for this damage other than being thrown out of office with a healthy super++ nest egg! Duh?
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I listen to 2GB in the morning while getting my grandson off to school so I hear half hourly news. No mention has been made to the power problems in SA. It has not been on the 6 PM TV news either although their problem has been well and truly overshadowed by the floods along the Darling system. I note the hopeful for leadership in NSW after the next election, Chris Minns, has already ruled out dams as a flood mitigation or drought alleviation measure. Better electorally to promise free stuff to city voters. I also note Albo has been telling the G20 in Bali how Australia can play a huge role in feeding the world. He forgot to add that in his last budget he stopped funding an irrigation dam complex at Hells Gate that would have created the means to fullfil his boast. Albo the politician can speak out of both sides of his mouth simultaneously.
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I meant to add that once again we are being let down by the fourth estate which nowadays is merely an echo chamber for the left. They do not challenge the current “truth” and are therefore more than useless. Imagine if the EV advocates were asked to explain the 60,000 km emission payback period before they start saving CO2 or the immense extra mineral resources and commensurate environmental damage caused by the manufacture of the green grid. What if the media asked Bowen and Kean to provide the shareholders, us, with a Product Disclosure Statement before we are asked to commit our hard earned to their schemes.
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The ‘Fourth Estate’ are in reality 5th columnists.
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No coverage of the SA power issues in The Australian over the last few days, but there were a couple of comments about it.
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The SA situation is not news unless it goes down. Nobody in the mainstream cares about what’s happening while power stays available. Everything is normal, it’s all under control, nothing to see here.
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The Finkel report made no mention of FCAS and curtailment. These are the really big issues in South Australia this week driving the whole show.
The Finkel report was prepared by incompetent academics who actually believe a trace gas can cause Earth to warm up. The latter indicates they have never made an observation outdoors.
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This from the story…
How would the little man in the street get damages awarded for failure of the grid to supply within the mandated voltage range? How many voltage spikes are needed before appliances fail?
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Just like dead/dying EV batteries, solar panels will cause a major problem with the disposal and expensive replacement costs. EVs will kill the used car market! Governments are herding us into penury with their futile race to carbon neutrality. All for the sake of dubious claims about CO2 and global warming!
Is this the NWO endgame? Klaus Schwab did rather let the cat out of the bag with his “you will own nothing and be happy” comment!
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The UK is introducing Car excise duty for Ev’s from 2025 . Currently they aren’t taxed. They will still get away with not paying their fair share as other drivers pay a huge amount in tax on petrol they put in their cars but it’s a start.
Do Oz EV drivers pay a tax or are they freeloading on other drivers when they use the roads?
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I think some states have introduced a distance tax for EV’s but I think it is charged at a much lower rate than the taxes on petrol/gasoline vehicles.
And all the rich people have their EV toys / virtue signaling devices and can’t understand why poor people aren’t buying them in droves.
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Our looney Labor state of Victoria has an unpopular tax on EVs.
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SB #5444 Implementing a per mile charge on electric and hybrid vehicles.
Washington State, a left coast standout, had Senate Bill 5444 introduced on Feb 10th 2021. The State is run by eco-crazies, also known as Democrats, with Chair and Vice-Chair of the Transportation Committee both of the D-party. The bill is “in committee” and going nowhere.
The bill asked that the State create a plan for implementing a Road Usage Charge (RUC) on electric and hybrid vehicles by December 1, 2022.
Another deadline missed.
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When the current rooftop solar systems reach their use-by will they be replaced? I think that is a fair question. I know of some whose units were seriously degraded after 10 years and have vowed they will not be replaced as they cannot see the advantage. Maybe just use them to heat the water until they finally collapse or run a powered skylight.
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I have just had a chance to determine the degradation on some of the solar panels I had installed 10 years ago. Between 4 and 6 %.
Varies a bit with the actual sunlight received. That seems to be a scarce commodity right now in southern WA.
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I think under Labor regimes or Labor-like regimes such as NSW, Australia’s energy situation is only going to get worse. Far worse.
And with a lack of leadership within the Liberals (pretend conservative party), plus their move to the Left, they have nothing to offer.
There are pro-energy, pro-science, pro-reason independents from the several pro-freedom parties but they are few in number.
I think Australians need to focus on setting up small solar systems that can at least keep some household lighting going, keep phones and laptop computers charged, keep radio going, maybe keep a TV, internet router and refrigeration going to see them through predicted regular outages. Heating and cooling will be out of the question, of course. You can make such a small solar system independent of household wiring so no regulatory issues and it is within the realm of most home handymen.
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I may not be a planning engineer but it does not take me 14 pages to to explain why solar and wind energy are useless and will never replace a power grid supplied by coal and gas;
In fact I can explain it in one word ‘intermittent’ . . .
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I prefer more than one word.
Wind energy is more intermittent than solar energy. Wind energy is intermittent 24/7. Solar energy is only intermittent between the hours of dawn and dusk, during the hours from dusk to dawn there is nothing intermittent about the sun’s energy, there is none.
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Map, I saw a description once that described ‘occasional energy’ as ‘as it comes’.
I prefer ‘Ephemeral Energy’, like those small creeks that run in the wet season when water isn’t needed and are dry for the rest of the year when water is desperately needed.
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It’s interesting though, because solar’s known cyclic behaviour means that its usage and backup requirements are in general defined and this can be designed into a mostly reliable energy system along with backup batteries. However, the totally intermittent nature of wind energy means that you can never design a reliable and profitable energy system using wind energy.
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People still seem to be able to get it wrong
https://joannenova.com.au/2019/10/oopsie-cloud-causes-system-black-event-at-alice-springs-affecting-thousands/
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And i would add one further word to the description …
..UNPREDICTABLE .
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They say wind is cheaper…wellll……false
– Expensive to manufacture per Mw with offshore even more expensive
– Expensive to install….hundreds of installations of small capacity generation
– Expensive to maintain..multiple mobile teams, heavy transport, heavy maintenance machinery and for offshore double the cost
– Forestation removal for turbines
– Expensive and multiple power lines to connect the exiting grid with rentals to land holders for the life of the line
– Expensive upgrades to the grid to control the fluctuations of solar and wind which may include batteries (limited power delivered), frequency stabilisers all which produce no electricity but makes costs dearer.
– Low efficiency approx. 33% , limited life so effective capital cost per Mw skyrockets
– Cost of backup needed and the added cost of backup when not being used, both capital cost and running costs.
– Life span can be 1/3 of coal fired stations so replacements costs and disposal costs
With replacement wind generation repeat all the expensive steps above
Then the quote 60,000 jobs will be created, that’s $6 billions customers will have to pay.
With renewables that’s why they are expensive and will always be expensive
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For many the ice above the water rightful provides sufficient warning to avoid the iceberg. For others a bit of exposition around the ice underwater may be needed.
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There are many ways to store energy e.g; batteries, pump water uphill, create hydrogen. All it takes is forward planning and infrastructure.
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That’s the fantasy. That’s nonsense written by the billionaire subsidy-harvesters for the uninformed, the uneducated and the weak-minded who support their nefarious plans.
The reality is that people who promote such schemes have absolutely no clue of the engineering reality or the infeasibility large amounts of money to do as proposed.
An even worse problem is that there is not enough lithium, or even lead in the world for all the batteries required and not enough sites or even concrete for all the pumped storage schemes that would be required.
Forget about a “hydrogen economy”. Hydrogen is a nightmare for even NASA to handle.
Here is a discussion on the infeasibility of using pumped storage plus unreliables for the United States. Read it and understand.
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/11/pump-up-the-storage/
Australia will be a far worse case because it is so flat, geographically speaking.
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“Here is a discussion on the infeasibility of using pumped storage plus unreliables for the United States. Read it and understand.” You are addressing Simon DM. Good luck with your last sentence becoming reality.
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Everything is a problem for NASA!
Look at the fiasco called Hubble.
I know everyone hates Hydrogen like they hate Russia but once its major problems are overcome things will change, and indeed a major storage and safety breakthrough has been made. More soon.
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… but once its major problems are overcome …
You forgot the “\SARC” tag.
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Fine !, but some /most of those “major problems” have no known practical solution !
You can refine production methods to improve efficiency and costs somewhat, but storage, transportation, safety, efficient and cost effective conversion back to electricity are still huge obsticles.
And it it is still just a “storage” option, not a prime energy source.
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How can you hate Russia?
Do an image search with the following string”
Udmurtia, Russia red heads
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And generating multiple times more energy than you actually need to offset the efficiency losses and massive cost increases and wasting more resources with more mining and real pollution and consumption of even more fossil fuels to build all the components in China. I could go on but if you can’t spot a dud idea when you see one…..
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I have a bridge I would like to sell Simon.
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Why stop at one?
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Excellent comprehensive reply Mr G&N.
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And a very large amount of money, which presumably you expect other people to pay.
Please demonstrate you are not clueless about this by calculating out the cost of storage for South Australia (no interconnect with other states) using batteries at today’s prices. Show your working, including the risk of total blackout for the final system (hint: it never comes to zero).
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Tel:
Like all ‘believers’ in Renewables Simon doesn’t (can’t?) do arithmetic.
The answer you are looking for is very slightly under $3,500 million or $196.300 per head of population.
That is for 6 days storage. Given that overcast days with little wind seem to be coming more frequent this seems a reasonable estimate.
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Why? Up until now, it was available at the end of a wire – reliably 24/7 with no fuss. It still can be.
This energy catastrophe is self-inflicted by groups who do not fully understand the consequences of their actions. If they do, then they have an agenda that has little to do with climate change. If climate change is their worry, then they must work out how to control solar cycle activity before destroying our ability to do any research whatsoever due to economic vandalism and researcher inquisitions.
Nuclear is the logical answer.
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Nuclear is wonderful, of course.
But it’s main advantage, in terms of supposed greenhouse issues, compared to coal and gas, is that it doesn’t generate the claimed cause of claimed global warming which is CO2.
By people on the rational side of science saying “nuclear is the logical answer” seems to imply that there is indeed a CO2 problem when there isn’t.
Well the real problem with CO2 is there isn’t enough of it, we came very close to a mass extinction event had CO2 levels continued to drop. Plants start to die at 150ppm but need much more to thrive. 1000ppm to 1500ppm is optimal for plant growth so we have a way to go yet.
Whether power is generated by coal, gas, nuclear or real hydro (not SH2) should be a decision based on the economics of any given situation.
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“Nuclear is the logical answer.”
NO !
Nuclear is totally unnecessary in Australia.
We have pretty much the best supply of quality coal in the world. .
That is what we have been using for a stable cheap supply for the last many years, and that is what we should continue to use.
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True b.n, it is necessary for the power transition to nuclear. But coal has many other uses apart from combustion alone – gasification, coal-to-oil conversion, petrochemical industries etc. Why not put coal aside for future use and generate power from nuclear which could drive these industries? Oz is ok for natural gas but pretty short on liquid hydrocarbons.
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No, you’re right Simon. There’s also that wonderful technology from the ” Back to the Future” movie with Michael Fox as the main character. The DeLoreon car they used to travel into the future had a flux capacitor as its fuel source. They shoved in a banana peel and they had endless power for the car. We should use that technology as well. Plus unicorn farts and maybe whatever powered the spaceships on Star Trek.
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Yes exactly Simon, I mean we can do it with water.
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Well then. Idiots like you can pay for the infrastructure.
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Again, with the fantasies. Fantasies that don’t work !!
To store the amount of energy required to run a stable grid using wind and solar with cost billions and billions of dollars…
…. and that’s if enough materials can be found, which have to be mined and processed..
It is a FOOL’s fantasy !!
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Yes simon, it is very simple, I guess the two go together, about the only harebrained scheme we haven’t had extolled to us is a giant rubber band on a giant generator, should work as well as the other ones.
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Something that worries me is that all the Lithium in the world will get used up in batteries and there will be none left for all the crazy people, of which there seems to be plenty and growing by the day.
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Simon, you would likely know from your own experience with anything with batteries that they go flat in the blink of an eye, they leak and destroy the article they were powering, they never work when you desperately need them to, and your car battery, how long did that last, 2, 3 4 years, then you dump it and pay $$$$$ for a new one.
At least with the lithium ones, you get a free pyrotecnics show now and then.
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‘There are many ways to store energy e.g; batteries …’
Particularly in small isolated communities.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/nov/17/new-battery-technology-could-be-a-game-changer-for-regional-australian-communities
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and trillions of dollars off the money tree down the bottom of the garden with the cis gender fairies.
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Let’s cheer for the lifting of weights:
https://sp-ao.shortpixel.ai/client/to_auto,q_lossy,ret_img,w_600/https://www.optimistdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/download-3-5-e1598979517818.jpeg
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That’s working well… https://youtu.be/XxGQgAr4OCo
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The most effective form of energy storage in Australian history has been large piles of quality coal very close to coal fired power stations.
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Even better – energy storage by CO2. Based on known process, uses standard components, recycles (some) heat and might be cheapest method. That popping sound will be Greenies head explosions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPHkCbeQNxI
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I don’t know how this can be turned around within 10 years or even a longer period and we are heading over a cliff if we don’t WAKE UP.
Most Aussies are totally clueless and don’t understand any of the basics and a majority don’t have the confidence to even try to understand.
But when the crap hits the fan across the states in the coming decades everyone will be up in arms and the guilty parties will be punished by the voters if there’s a more intelligent group who promises to fix the entire fraudulent mess.
Obviously we shouldn’t be changing to TOXIC, UNRELIABLE S & W or EVs and we should be building new RELIABLE coal powered stns across all the states ASAP and thereby guaranteeing jobs and new businesses for the rest of the century.
But in the coming decades we’ll be wasting TRILLIONs of $ for a ZERO return and the entire TOXIC mess will be a curse forever. Unless we WAKE UP.
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It is not ZERO return. It is Negative return. We are constantly told that “renewables” mean jobs, jobs, jobs, A lot in Australia and a lot in China. That means that productivity it in rapid decline. There will be extraordinary demand for workers in the “renewables” industry adding layer upon layer of additional costs.
China will need to rapidly ramp up coal production if it has any hope of meeting the demand for all the “renewable” stuff. Manufacturing is based on coal so China needs to up their game so the rest of the world can slide into low productivity poverty.
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The idea of turning our once reliable, cheap mainly coal/ gas/hydro ) powered electricity grid has a great analogy. It’s like jumping off a cliff and then trying to invent a parachute on the way down. A bit like a Road runner/ Coyote Looney tunes cartoon.
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The two operating grid scale farms in SA have a combined capacity just over 300MW. They have single axis tracking arrays so can hit peak power around 9am and maintain that till around 4pm this time of year. The big dip at 9am to past 10am would have been curtailment. Could have been forced or voluntary curtailment based on lack of of FCAS capacity or FCAS cost.
NSW consumers are already contributing $11 per year for the EnergyConnect project that enables NSW consumers to enjoy all the free energy from SA just like we do in Victoria. The cost goes up to $22 per year once the line is working.
These additional costs for transmission lines are baked in for decades. Who thinks that electricity prices will come down in Australia?
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You can bet that there will be no expense spared getting the interconnected up and running. Who pays for that work and who benefits?
The current situation gives a glimpse into the Ponzi scheme and how South Australia is leaching off Victoria. The problem is that the all governments are too incompetent to understand what is happening.
We can only hope Europeans freeze this winter to give an early warning of where the idiocracy is leading the developed nations.
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Rick,
Have you noticed that today (18/11) SA curtailment is over 1300MW !…..must be close to a record ?
But still they continue to import 200MW ? ..!!
Why dont they run their own CCG generators ?
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The wholesale price is presently MINUS $51/MWh. and there is a price cap on the lower regulator raise service. SA gas would need to be ordered into that market. It is no doubt lower cost to get whatever is available from Victoria.
The high level of curtailment underscores how South Australia is leaching off the rest of the country on sunny days. And the consumers in NSW are paying the bulk of the cost for the new EnergyConnect project so they can get access to all this free energy.
The FCAS market will be the big earner in SA this week so it has been priced capped as of today.
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It’s cloudy again today, so presumably we are less leech-like than we were yesterday.
Your comments seem to imply that the average Joe/Jo here is somehow complicit in bludging off the honest, hard-working burghers of NSW & Vic whilst laughing evilly all the way to the bank. I presume you understand we are as much victims of this New Age madness as other Australians. Don’t you? Do you think we voted for this – to see perfectly good power stations blown up and mining towns (Leight Creek) ruined?
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More South Australians voted for it than those who didn’t. The Liberals saw value in going green as well and upped the green promises.
Australia no longer makes anything of note – maybe toilet paper! So the country has a good chance of making weather dependent generation working but it won’t be lower cost than you can make yourself if you own a roof.
Reality might be just around the corner in some of the woker corners of the Northern Hemisphere but I cannot see a change in the zealotry in Australia for at least 3 years.
If you expect it to change then you are not getting out enough.
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mmmmm bit like how all Victorian must love corruption because more voted for Andrews than didnt
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. . . here’s an article influencing the view from a small block in a small town in South Australia this morning . . . . .
https://www.globalresearch.ca/how-blackrock-larry-fink-created-global-energy-crisis/5799286
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Andrew Bolt recently talked to Mark Mills about the present and future global energy requirements in the coming decades.
He even includes comment from Labors Bowen donkey and Mark Mills has a chuckle before he comments.
This takes just 11 minutes and Mark tries to explain the engineering problems and the endless TRILLIONs of $ cost to try to transition away from fossil fuels.
He even includes the CLOUD SIZE and includes a comparison to Japan’s economy to try and sort out their silly fantasies.
I hope everyone has the time to watch this video and I’m sure you’ll learn something from Mark and his very articulate, accurate explanation of a very complex problem.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XymJogShmmU
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It is brilliant that Bolt went to the trouble of getting the tape of Flim-Flan quoting the rain will never fill the dams. You have to wonder the state of journalism in Australia when Flim-Flan remains the go to commentator on all things to do with climate.
I wonder when the morons at BoM and CSIRO will get up from fiddling with their useless climate models, take a look at the weather outside then proclaim they got it HORRIBLY WRONG. The mal-investment their incompetence has underpinned is generational in its impact.
Global cooling is alive and well during November in Australia.
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Was watching the ODI cricket last night, Australia vs England from the Adelaide Oval. I was half expecting the lights to go out at any moment. But then realised the ground probably has a lovely set of diesel generators humming away somewhere powering the whole ground , just in case.
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Not sure when this was written.
https://turfmate.com.au/shift-to-diy-power-at-adelaide-oval/
SEE LINK FOR REST
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WTF is DIY power??? Just a clever way of saying they’ve installed a diesel generator. Thanks for that.
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Just more really poor reporting, you see it every day.
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All the big touring bands are powered by their own gen sets, usually 1000kva sets that run so quietly you only know they’re going by the gauges.
A more relevant example is the last tour of the bunch of hypocrites known as Midnight Oil. They stated their tour was going to be powered by renewables, then it became wherever possible, then it disappeared because they used gensets as that’s the only thing that is portable and 100% reliable.
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Peter Garrett, ‘Every appearance a sellout’, LOL
Some clown probably thought they could run their hired gensets on recycled veggie oil until they got told it would void any warranty or insurance on the engines, so it got quietly ‘forgotten’.
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That’s the great thing about DIY , you can do it yourself!
Actually said in a Bunnings advert in the 90s. Got pulled pretty quickly.
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Went to a Rolling Stones concert in the ’90’s and noticed around the back of the stadium was a bank of massive silenced diesel gensets , each almost the size of a 20ft container.
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I wouldn’t have thought they would require “silencing” at a ‘Stones concert.
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“Green” (sic) energy was a failure for the National Socialists 90 years ago.
Why are present day socialists trying to repeat the same lunacy?
Reference:
Green Tyranny: Exposing the Totalitarian Roots of the Climate Industrial Complex by Darwall, Rupert (ISBN: 9781594039355)
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Its funny because i walk around in this God forsaken state looking at people who have no idea what is going on around them, if it all went dark in an instant they would probably blame Putin.
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At this stage almost every state in Australia is god forsaken, because it doesn’t matter which party is in power they all have the same loony ideas on energy.
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Or Trump.
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I can see that power generated has to match power consumed. Instead of trying to cut off solar generation why don’t they just make a large resistor to dissipate the power. They could use it to boil water.
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Or let the plebs have cheap hot water via a Zellweger type relay.
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You cant do that Pete because when a cloud moves a little bit in the wrong direction the power required to feed the resistor load has to come from somewhere else and the frequency drops through the floor and you get a blackout
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It must be simple enough to have a variable feed to the resistor, Flinders Island can do it.
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It’s more straightforward to just turn them off. It’s not as if they didn’t see it coming. It’s indicative of the poor design of the entire RE transition.
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Interesting that OpenNem has zero data for South Australia today as of now
https://opennem.org.au/energy/sa1/?range=1d&interval=30m
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Try nemlog instead..
http://nemlog.com.au/gen/region/sa/
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So how much are the developing countries claiming for their climate change reparations?
Well we’ve been told it could be collectively a total of a TRILLION $ per year, but Colombia alone has put in an early estimate of 800 billion $ or 0.8 TRILLION $.
So with the Bowen loony leading our Aussie reparations team at COP 27 we could be in for a very nasty shock when the final reparations are announced.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/11/16/cop27-colombia-claims-an-absurd-800-billion-a-year-loss-and-damage/
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Can I ask AGAIN for an items list detailing why we should compensate so called developing countries since 1800 or 1900 or 2000?
Is it the much higher life expectancy, or higher calories or the much higher standard of living or the massive 96% reduction in deaths from extreme weather events or…….etc, etc?
No alarmist seems to know but everyone still wants to BELIEVE in their fantasy world.
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There won’t be much left after they get the bill for the War On Drugs.
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In Australia we have become used to low and rapidly dropping expectations of the competence of government.
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But we still have to vote (or turn up and be checked off) for the latest gaggle of car salesmen/real estate agents/doctors/musicians fleeing their careers for the comfy gravy train of “polly-tics” [ (c)JC2 2022] where they can screw up everything they touch and still get immunity, pay rises and indexed super.
Roll out the Genoa system!
We all know the curtain comes down for the west in 2032 but in reality (don’t ask) it’ll be 2028/29 so that’s 6 or 7 years left to produce the green utopia…
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Poli, many….. tics, blood sucking lice, sounds about right.
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Usually when I vote, I’m just looking for the least worst.
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I view South Australia’s current situation as a preview of the dystopian future that is coming to all of us thanks to the moronic actions of politicians.
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How is it dystopia though? we see it as a place on the brink, but the good folk of SA are going about their business, international cricket is played, the vines in the Barossa are greening up. They all pay a lot for power but they dont look very dystopian.
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I was told that once you connected your solar panels to the grid, they were in control.
So when that massive roof top power was lost, it was not available to householders either, to charge batteries or heat swimming pools or charge Teslas. So when you had a black out, you were blacked out too. Which seemed a completely crazy situation.
But I am not aware of the current situation with large domestic lithium batteries. So everyone has to buy big Tesla batteries too?
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You can’t have extraneous feeds going to the grid after it’s tripped, the linies would get zapped.
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Add a halfway-decent battery to your home solar system and I doubt that you will be able to pay off the system in the battery’s lifetime. Perhaps if our electricity costs double, it might be a viable proposition.
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TdeF:
A friend who narrowly (by 4 houses) missed out on being blacked out reported that some neighbouring owners of household batteries couldn’t get any power out. Possibly something to do with frequency?
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It’s Black Friday in SA, and at 9.30am there was a special wholesale electricity deal – spot price negative $99.99/MWhr. Quick, switch on all your appliances and get not just free, but we pay you to use all the spare electrons.
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So can you switch on your dishwasher and aircon and the meter goes backwards, cool.
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Something tells me it doesnt quite work like that for consumers ..
Its a wholesale price, so yes, Hornsdale can get paid for charging their battery, ..
..and those businesses with wholesale power contracts could cash in…
..but average Joe down the street is still going to pay 30+c/kWh to fry his breakfast .
The grid generators are playing in a different game of power costs to you and me.
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It’s ‘ heads we win, tails you lose.’
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I love these electricity threads, I learn something every time.
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Here’s a plan plug the AUKUS nuclear subs into the power grid when there not on patrol…….no I’m joking don’t take this seriously
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Under the present government, we’re unlikely to get them any time soon anyway.
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We won’t get them because the government won’t want to upset the Chicomms.
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It’s not that silly, when can we lease one and get it working for us.
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Does anyone remember the dire straits Tasmania got into when the Bass Interconnector broke.
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If its Dire Straits or Rolling Stones, I’m going with the Stones- or was that another thread?
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A few ways the grid can fail.
Govt incompetence and meddling.
Coronal mass ejection.
Cyber hacking.
Severe storms.
EMP delivered by North Korea or Russia.
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It’s a strange old world. In times long ago, ‘inventions’ such as retail electricity, delivered to your house had people queuing up to buy it. companies could raise money easily due to be obvious and natural demand for a new project. We could all name a few of them such as the mobile phone, followed by the smart phone. Manufacturers could not supply the demand. The biggie was the car/automobile. Any colour as long as it was black!
And no government support, mandates or interference at all.
Someone thought of an idea, engineered it, manufactured it and it sold.
Now we get idiots proposing hydrogen as an ‘energy source’/s !!!
Yes of course it could be implemented. But it would be so expensive no one, not a single customer would willingly switch from natural gas to hydrogen at 2 or 3 or 4 times the price.
So the idiots propose subsidies to the manufacturers of these hydrogen supply chain,
Where to these subsidies come from – us the people.
It’s as though history and commonsense has been lost.
It is so sad.
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so you think this may not be a great idea then?
https://ieefa.org/articles/plans-unveiled-queensland-renewable-based-hydrogen-super-hub
or this
https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/news/4-billion-industry-response-to-hydrogen-hubs
or this
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-11/sa-planned-hydrogen-hub-explained/101138894
or this
https://www.mediastatements.wa.gov.au/Pages/McGowan/2022/10/5-5-million-dollar-boost-for-Mid-West-Hydrogen-Hub.aspx
Its clearly the way of the future. Australia will be awash with Hydrogen before we know it.
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…NO !
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Asia Times articles on nuclear and ‘renewables’:
Part 1: https://asiatimes.com/2020/01/carbon-dioxides-scourge-advanced-nuclear-power/
Part 2: https://asiatimes.com/2020/01/germanys-overdose-of-renewable-energy/
An excerpt from Part 2:
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