What other heavily subsidized industry brags about its ability to provide a product for one quarter of the time it’s needed? Vale sunny-day-solar!
Pick a day, an hour, and what are the chances solar will be there for you? A lot less than one in four, because last Monday’s peak in South Australia was an all time record. Every day in the last year was worse.
And so much for cheap… the price when solar power peaked was still close to $50/MWh. Compare that to most of the years of the national electricity market operating when average prices were $30/Mwh.
The price dip at 6am (the black-line bottomless gully), has nothing to do with solar, but was caused by wind power. Far from being useful, essential, or productive, solar and wind power are playing havoc with a normal market, destroying the chance for cheap, reliable energy to find a place. As long as we force the market to accept this non-dispatchable supply, we are actively punishing reliable power. What investor in reliable energy would look at this and head to South Australia?”
Giles Parkinson was excited at Reneweconomy: Rooftop solar provides 48% of South Australia power, pushing grid demand to a record low.
South Australia’s level of minimum demand hit a new record low this weekend – barely a week after the previous benchmark was set – with a fall to just 587MW on Sunday afternoon.
We can see what a wild spike this particular lunchtime peak was:
The record eclipsed the previous mark by nearly 200MW – with AEMO data showing minimum demand at 1.30pm of exactly 587.8MW, compared with the previous low mark of 786.42MW posted last Sunday. (See graph above courtesy of Melbourne’s Climate and Energy College).
That is a phenomenal share of 47.8 per cent of the state’s electricity demand being met by rooftop solar (compares with 36 per cent in the previous record last week) and is clearly a record for South Australia, and for that matter in any large grid anywhere in the world.
Parkinson seems to think a slight dip in exorbitantly high prices is a good thing?
The impact of rooftop solar is being felt in prices – look at the black line that shows prices fall as rooftop solar accounts for a sizeable share of demand during the day.
Yes, let’s look at the black-line price “dip” (but don’t compare it with the long term price for electricity when renewables were a smaller part of the grid.)
The South Australians are in deep:
South Australia is the first region where rooftop solar PV has caused a shift in minimum demand from night time to the middle of the day (most states still have electric hot water being switched on at night, when it would make sense to use the “solar sponge” as Queensland has suggested).
We could reprogram all the hot water heaters to automatically switch on in the middle of the day. Bravo. When it’s not so record-breaking-sunny (which is nearly every other day), we’ll a/ pay more for hot water, or b/ have cold showers? We could use the hot water tanks to store solar energy — but isn’t that what we make solar-hot-water-heaters for, and aren’t they more efficient at it? Why not heat the water direct instead of using PV cells to generate electricity, then use the electricity to heat the water? Is this the big advance Parkinson is excited about?
How “good” is a market price of minus $44?
Note, also, the negative price of minus $44/MWh at 6am when there was abundant wind and a constraint on the connector with Victoria.
The sign of a screwed market. Let me build a plant and pay you to take my electricity…. How does that work as a free market, nay, socialist plan — just fine. Would you like nationalized coal with that? The only company that can afford to run the cheapest generator in the market is one with shareholders who are forced to pay and never ask for a dividend.
It also questions the need for old fashioned concepts such as “baseload”, which would struggle to find a niche in a market dominated by wind and solar, where mostly “dispatchable” and flexible generation is needed to fill in the gaps. Wind energy is already producing more than 100 per cent of local demand at certain times.
Baseload is old fashioned in the same sense that cooking dinner at 6-9pm is. Ninety nine percent of Australia is still living the baseload dream.
PS: There are still subsidies for Solar Hot water systems in Australia, and according to wiki, even after the subsidy it takes nearly 7 years to “pay back” the solar hot water system even in the sunniest country on Earth. (See “costs”.)
figure this is a good place to post the following on a different kind of solar heating.
posted this link on a previous thread, after hearing a lot of alarmist talk on MSM last week:
20 Sept: ABC: Brisbane weather: City and Ipswich set to sizzle through scorcher weekend
By Meghna Bali
boxed forecasts – Brisbane
Saturday 32C Max
Sunday 34C Max
Monday 35C Max
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-20/brisbane-ipswich-set-for-hot-weekend-weather/8961426
Heatwave to hit Sydney and Brisbane this weekend
9news.com.au-19 Sep. 2017
actual Max temps from BoM, if I’m reading them properly:
Saturday 28.5C
Sunday 28.9C
Monday 29.0C
MSM doesn’t report that their scorcher predictions were wrong. instead, they move on to new “scorchers”:
25 Sept: BundabergNewsMail: SCORCHER: Record-breaking temps as QLD, NSW set to sizzle
by Benedict Brook and Ally Foster and staff writers
AUSTRALIA is sweating through summer-like conditions with record-breaking heat slamming NSW and Queensland over the weekend…
25 Sept: GoldCoastBulletin: Heatwave on way for Queensland and Gold Coast as September weather records tumble
by ANDREW POTTS, EMILY SELLECK, & CLARE ARMSTRONG
Brisbane is expected to reach a top of 34C today, with temperatures hovering in the high 20s until Thursday, when the maximum is set to soar to 37C, which is 1.9C higher than the all-time September record…
http://www.goldcoastbulletin.com.au/news/gold-coast/heatwave-on-way-for-queensland-and-gold-coast-as-september-weather-records-tumble/news-story/dc6aefb550871ee5d398e0060028dce0
no wonder the public thinks there’s GLOBAL WARMING!
shame on the MSM, as always.
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Give me your capex and I will guarantee that no electric bill will hit your household in ten years.
I will even harass you with upgrades to the capex on a constant basis.
If you can’t add up and hate power companies have I got a deal for you!
50
So true and solar hot water makes perfect sense as opposed to PV power because it is (sorta) reliable. That heat can be stored for almost 24 hours depending on the tank insulation. PV on the other hand is a disaster waiting to happen, and is only good enough when backed by a nice diesel generator and a small battery system. It’s a pity the solar hot water people continue to think people will actually pay $3500 for a hundred bucks of parts. Indeed once when my HWS was on the fritz I made a 25 litre solar HWS out of a black reject shop crate, and 10m of ldpe irrigation tubing at a total cost of about 12 bucks.
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Oops, it was a 50+ litre one because the reject shop plastic box was 56 lt.
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Bobl, if you have DIY instructions I’m sure other readers would be interested. Please email me. 🙂
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Indeed.
31
Jo it probably isn’t of that much interest because it’s “Bushie” technology but here goes.
I put a $7, 56lt black plastic box on the roof, with a piece of clear perspex I had lying around screwed to the top with a couple of stainless screws as a lid, at the bottom on the end nearest the gutter I drilled a hole and put a through hole irrigation coupling that went to ldpe 13mm garden tubing then to a T. One side of the T goes down to a tap with a snap on fitting for the tap. This is used to fill the box. The other side of the T ran into the window of the bathroom via a valve to a hand shower. Once in the box gravity is enough to feed the shower. If the hand shower has a non leaking shutoff then you don’t need the valve, but the shutoff on my hand shower leaks so I had to put in a valve. So to fill the tank turn off the hand shower and on the tap and the box fills up. Then this feeds back down the hose to the hand shower when the tap is off.
Because the box is black it heats up during the day and around 5 at night it’s just right for a shower, earlier in the day sometimes cold water needed to be added to cool it down to shower temp.
In winter I added the following mod, I drilled two holes in the far side (away from the gutter) one in the bottom and another about 60% up the side and put fittings through both, then added a loop of black LDPE tubing between top and bottom forming a loop. Provided the water level is above the top hole a thermosihphon is formed circulating water through the loop from bottom to top. This just laid on the hot roof getting radiation from the roof and the sun. In winter this about doubled the temperature (but makes the water too hot in summer – a valve could be added in the loop to stop the thermosiphon in summer). So all I did was this, in the morning I’d fill the tank, an hour later the water was warm enough for a shower. We existed on this for months. Was almost sad to decommission it when we got a new water heater since it was free and now we have a water heating bill again!
The biggest problem was that I didn’t insulate the box and double glaze the transparent lid, this meant that it lost heat at night rather quickly and by around 8PM it was too cold to shower in. Still, as long as you picked your shower times it worked fine. 50 lt is enough for 3 people to take short showers. Add more boxes if you want more heated water and join then to the T.
So there you are, a solar HWS for an hour of DIY time and 12 bucks. Beats $3500.
PS I live in Queensland (although right now I’m in Perth), it’s warm during the day all year round, although it gets cold at night in winter where we are (around 0C) . This technique works OK there, try to do the same thing is a Tasmanian winter and you’ll probably be disappointed.
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“So there you are, a solar HWS for an hour of DIY time and 12 bucks. Beats $3500.”
Nice idea; but how do I recharge this Iphone? 🙂
00
I don’t know Will, do you charge you mobile phone with your electric HWS?
10
What you’ve made is a simple batch water heater. You can do the same with a 200l drum painted black. If you want an ICS, bury the bottom half of the drum in insulation and cover the top with glazing as suggested. If you want a thermosiphon, attach a pipe as you did but make sure the tank return is at the highest point of the loop and that water can flow through the entire pipe using a change in density. Any kinks or areas where the pipe is higher than following pipe will stop the flow.
Just about the entire USA requires closed loop systems due to freezes unless you have homeowners who are prepared to do the time and know how to shut off the system in cold weather. It doesn’t necessarily mean glycol. Drainback systems using distilled water are wonderful and are more tolerant of the summer heat.
The problem with solar water heating systems is that PV has become so cheap and so many people are getting it installed, that it is easier to add a few extra panels and heat the water electrically. Efficiency has nothing to do with it when government subsidies have upended the market. That said; if I was getting PV on my roof, I too would get a few extras panels and forget about solar water heating.
Someone commented that in freezing conditions, open loop systems can still be used. Caveat emptor: only in light freezes for a short period of time. There’s a couple of ways of doing this. One is by relying on a temperature sensor to turn on a pump to keep the water circulating during freezing conditions. The other way relies on a dribble valve that discharges water onto the roof and doesn’t allow the water in the pipes to stagnate in freezing conditions. In both cases, you’re trusting a $3500+ system entirely to a $40 dollar component. There’s no if. When that part fails, your entire system is toast.
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Presumably you could incorporate some expansion areas within the water ciculation loop, so when the water freezes, it will just expand up into maybe the header tank without anything breaking?
10
Sounds good on paper perhaps, but doesn’t work in practice. Most systems are pressurized mains water supply. The first parts to freeze are the exposed, small cross sections. Expansion points won’t help unless everything can expand. Pipes will just freeze where they can’t expand.
10
Great idea for closed cycle bathing fluid! Add gobs of Epsom salt, MgSO4, for superior bathing experiance!! With this ‘admixture\solution check for local H2O freezing; but you can color the (MgSO4·11H2O) crystals forming about your medium temperature bathing! Wonderful pictures with kids!
Still ‘how do I recharge this Iphone’? 🙂
20
I’m not sure Will. I use a mobile phone charger?
10
Use electricity?
00
If you’re in an area which has frosts in winter, then you need to design and build some anti-frost safety features into your roof-top solar water heater. Ice doesn’t know its own strength and will cheerfully split your water heater open as soon as it freezes.
Roof-top water heaters in NZ are plumbed in very carefully and the installation is quite complex, for this reason. It includes pressure-relief valves and continuous circulation. Pumps to get the water up there aren’t cheap, either.
That’s where the $3500 comes from. Despite the engineering, quite a few still split and have to be repaired after a sudden freeze.
40
If you are in a frost zone, you need to circulate glycol through the tubes that see the sun, and then heat the water with a plate heat exchange.
40
Not if they are LDPE and an unpressurised crate you don’t!
30
Check out a drainback system using distilled water. Works beautifully!
20
If you are in a frost zone, you need to circulate glycol through the tubes that see the sun, and then heat the water with a plate heat exchange.
40
I fell for solar hot water when it was the craze after Reagan pushed for subsidising it. It never paid me back its cost to me, never mind the cost of the tax break to government. I put in a second system, much better design than the first and it also did nothing according to my bottom line either and it was more expensive than the first one.
In both cases the water that went into my gas powered water heater was warmer than it would have been so I was saving on gas. But there was that initial cost sitting there, even after the tax credit that I never recovered.
So it was a net loss in both cases. I came out reasonably well only because I could refinance when interest rates dropped and paid off those loans with cheaper dollars.
Then there was the quality of the material problem. They never learned not to mix galvanized and copper pipe in the same system. That little detail had the galvanized part of the thing rusted shut in 2 years.
I never did try to figure out how the price of electricity to run the pumps was effecting the bottom line but at least electricity was cheap at that time.
Up and down the block here there were an assortment of different types of solar water heating equipment on the roofs. All of it has been gone now for a good 20 years.
I don’t know how solar electricity will go but my neighbors tell me it’s lowering their Edison bills significantly. But they’re not talking about their bottom line.
I think Jo probably has it right. We’re throwing the baby out with the bathwater and the cost is not going to go down but up.
Solar has become a four letter word to me. But I’ll eventually be forced into it by California. They have a goal of solar panels on every house.
90
If solar water heating had a real advantage, don’t you think it would still be in use? I do.
40
Hi Roy
As I mentioned below, we took the offer and had solar hot water installed. Our power bills dropped noticeably but that was 30 plus years ago. I remember I did work out a payback period with and without the subsidy but can’t remember the full details. I have a vague recollection that the breakeven period for us was about 7 years but irrationally long when the subsidy was added in.
Another case of government make work that was not sensible.
KK
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“Our power bills dropped noticeably but that was 30 plus years ago. I remember I did work out a payback period with and without the subsidy but can’t remember the full details. ”
Did you ever figure out how to recharge this damndable Iphone? 🙂
10
I think Roy that its unecessarily complex, and once the town planning and bureacrats get involved, it just collapses under the weight of its own stupidity.
Better to build you own system using solar pool heating tubing and plumb it direct into your own hot water system outlet, so you can manually select via a $20 hand valve, which one you draw water from. I suspect ( but cant be sure ) that you might be able to lay flexible rubber pool heater tubing on the roof without 50 layers of bureacratic red tape….
30
What I did other than my $7 crate was a $20 plastic fruit juice barrel (200l) which I filled with water, then I used a small solar powered 12V pump to circulate the water through a 20m black LDPE irrigation tubing loop laid on the roof. I put about 10 loops of copper pipe inside the barrel to transfer heat from the barrel water into the water inside the copper pipe, and plumbed the copper pipe into the cold water intake to my electric HWS. Theory was that by warming up the intake water the HWS wouldn’t need to use so much electricity to keep the HWS above it’s set point. It worked quite nicely, saved me about half my water heating bill.
I have run through the economics of Solar Hot water many times but the enormous cost of commercial Solar units (Around $3500) and with a heating bill of only $75 a quarter meant the payback was never going to happen. Instead the economics of adding 4 solar panels and an 800W heat pump HWS is far better.
00
The only solar pool heating systems I’ve seen apparently work fine when you want to keep the pool around 80°F. Remember, once the pool is up to temperature it’s a large mass so it won’t cool down very fast if you have a few overcast days, especially if you cover it as many now do to conserve water (believe it or not). But hot water for the dishwasher has to be a lot hotter than that and you need it every day. I’ve never tried your idea so I don’t know how well it will work and at this point I have other fish to fry so I’ll not be running any more plumbing up to the roof.
It gets to the point where I wonder why we don’t call it that old, “penny wise and pound foolish”.
10
An interesting aside about heating water — a few years back we installed a whole hose water filter and it has a tank in which the filter element resides. Since it needs to be backflushed periodically it has electric components and that prevents putting it outdoors. Running the pipe around to get to the garage where the filter could be put is no big deal and the rest of the hookup is trivial.
On any hot day the cold water in the house coming in from that filter feels too warm because the garage gets hot and the water in that filter is heated. I’ve wondered how much that may be saving me on natural gas.
00
…whole house…
Nuts!
00
If you look in a hot, sunny country like Israel, you’ll find almost all of the apartment blocks have solar water heaters. Our new house on the outskirts of Johannesburg, South Africa, came with solar heated water as standard. However, the remote (and timed) control for the electrical immersion heater element has stood us in good stead on cloudy or rainy days, and especially early on winter mornings with 3 degrees (C) outside!
20
Hi Russ
Over 30 years back now, we had a solar heater attached to our existing electric immersion tank.
Details are fuzzy but it was simple and I think that it was just preheating the water before entry to the tank.
Whatever, there was a welcome relief in electricity bills over the next year.
KK
00
There are quite a few ‘instructables’ on creating a simple solar-hot-water mechanism out of black poly pipe; others go all the way to a $300 job that will give you a 300l tank of hot water, with backup and thermostatic control. The $300 jobbie will have your hot water at 55°C – hot enough to scald (well, to scald a girl or a SNAG – anyway, 5 degrees above the suggested limit for hot water taps).
These setups are mostly written by Americans, who have to account for periods of genuinely freezing weather (the sort that a Strayan might experience when they ‘go to the snow’) – so they generally incorporate mechanisms to deal with and/or prevent ‘freezeover’ (which is not something that most Strayans would have to worry about).
The reason I’m interested in this is that my Dad is kind of a “super-handyman”: give him an idea and he can knock together a serviceable example in a day, that will last a decade. Mum and Dad just moved house, and Dad’s talking about swapping the existing (balloon-type) water heater for an ‘on demand’ gas jobbie.
Fair enough, Dad (says I)… but wouldn’t it be fun to
* build a large, flat, box with a glass lid;
* paint the rear surface black;
* fill it with black 1/2in poly pipe, arranged all reg’lar-like;
* stick it on the roof with a slight upward slope from entry to exit (hot rises)…
and see what happens?
We used black poly pipe as an experiment while on a camping holiday in France in September 2008, and the water wound up hotter than a hot tap: we could use the water to wash greasy dishes – and since French Camping involves tinned Confit de Canard and Cassoulet de Castelnaudaray, we’re talking about duck, goose and pork fat as opposed to canola or other easier-to-clean fats.
Anyone who goes camping has seen those black poly bags (‘camp showers’ – don’t mention the war); they hold about 20l, from memory, which is barely enough to have a rough shower. Fine for the first go, but they’re too ‘thick’ to get warm quickly (that’s why my brother Michael is always cold – he’s also too thick to warm quickly [ba-dum tissssh]).
By contrast, a 25m roll of 1″ poly pipe will heat to “Ow!” degrees in 15 minutes in direct sun, and can be mixed with river-water to give about 35l of bathing-temp water (and while one person is showering, the pipe can be used to heat water for the next bloke). You lay the pipe out like a big boerwurst: if it’s literally a full-sun Aussie summer’s day, it’ll need less than 15 minutes.
I know it violates the Real Aussie Bloke’s Code of Practice to come home after a camping trip not smelling like a wild boar’s armpit, but it’s the 21st century now… next thing we’ll all be watching “Dancing With The Stars” on streaming from a wifi portable hotspot (at which point, may as well bring the womenfolk – trip’s ruined).
30
Did you ever figure out how to recharge this damndable Iphone? 🙂
00
Renewables and their subsidies force up the electricity bills.
The higher bills encourage the better off to install PV solar.
The loss of volume and the subsidy for PV over-production get added onto those who still get bills, forcing them to use less or go off grid
Eventually, only those who cannot pay are expected to pay for all.
The whole system collapses.
251
Yes Graeme, the Power Networks actually know that this is an existential threat, but don’t care because they know the government can’t let the grid collapse.
200
That old saying about making hay while the sun shines ….
Profiteering until government steps in, and stops providing taxpayer funded subsidies that created the “bottom of the harbour” style subsidy and tax scheme.
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I suspect they do care, but have reached the point where arguing is pointless, and they might just as well go off and make as much money as they can under insane rules. I have worked with governments all over the world and most recently the UK government. Their ability to pursue stupid ideas even when many, many people point out the problems is extraordinary. Once a politician has a simple idea in his/her head, and the civil servants have lost the argument, there is simply no way of getting the state to change course. It can be the same in the private sector of course, but the thing that always saves us there is that there are markets and competition and nobody is forced to buy. So when a CEO does something stupid, we can all just go to his/her competitor instead.
90
Yes Minister!
wink
62
Tim
“Government wisdom” is usually an oxymoron
“Government enthusiasms” however abound – usually unfortunately imo
40
It also works the other way – when civil servants get ideas stuck in their heads and persuade politicians it is a ‘great idea’.
Sometimes it is based on CS own political beliefs / agenda and sometimes on pure wishful thinking.
The UK policy to ban sales of all but Electric cars from 2040 is one such example where the wishful thinking ignores the reality of the intractable problems of providing sufficient renewable energy to manufacture and power the cars coupled with the near impossible task of providing distribution / charging points that work – 43% of car owners are unable to park at their own property, let alone plug in and charge !
The only viable solution to the charging problem is completely the opposite of the way the motor industry has gone. It is as I first suggested in the late 1970s (after the fuel crisis of 1974/5) to use slide-out battery packs that can be changed for fully charged ones in the equivalent of a petrol station with a credit for any unused charge in the swapped battery. Interestingly I explained all of this to an international businessman about 5 years ago and I was interested to see that his home country, Israel, is now piloting this solution.
The oil companies, fuel distributor and petrol station operators should have begun working with motor manufacturers on this approach some time ago.
92
The Israeli company “Better Place” that developed the replaceable battery packs was a commercial failure despite attracting large investors. The story is here:
https://qz.com/88871/better-place-shai-agassi-swappable-electric-car-batteries/
21
I had a discussion with CAGW believing engineer ( surely an oxymoron, but alas, no…) who was rock solid in believing electric powered trucks could work. Not having delved into this, is is viable or more pie-in-sky stuff? I’d have thought half the truck weight would be batteries….and then if they keep removing grid generating capacity, how the dickens do you find the spare electrons to charge it, anyway?
30
Engineer in what capacity? Obviously not one involved in urban public transport or (s)he would have told you how absurd the notion is.
Sad that (s)he can’t do the math outside his/her speciality but then if (s)he believes in CAGW, then his/her viewpoint is pretty narrow already and (s)he probably idolises Elron Musk.
30
Anything is possible Steve, but depending on range and load the battery store rises. To drive a 50 Tonne truck + load up the Toowoomba range from Helidon which is a drive of around 5km for a rise of 500m takes 250 MJ or 70 kWh just to raise that load 500m up the range (not allowing for any horizontal motion or losses) if we allow for those then we would need at least 100kWh battery for that 5km trip up the range which is the entire contents of a tesla model S battery pack used up to raise the load just 500m over a 5km trip.
20
Tim, that squares with my experience with city and county government.
Therefore, it seems that SA is going to suffer until things get so bad that their grid crashes and stays out for a good period of time. Then the voters of SA will have two choices: 1)lower their standard of living and get used to doing without electricity at unpredictable times and durations and all that entails in quality of life, the economy, health and safety, etc. or,
2) Rise up and vote the leftist/greens out and try to build a new state infrastructure to maintain civilization.
60
And there you have exactly the problem. The utilities can hide behind whatever the local equivalent of the California Public Utilities Commission is and know they will always be allowed a price for their product that assures them of profitability. No other business in this world gets that kind of protection from failure, at least not here and not yet.
40
I was looking at my electricity bill last week, and noticed the Service Charge had been raised again. My daily usage was up slightly more than winter last year (previous high, so much for a warm winter) and the ‘off peak” supply was also charged at a higher rate. Splitting the Service Charge pro rata to the 2 rates made it obvious that it is now cheaper to run a diesel generator in SA than use electricity from the grid.
I have no idea what it costs to go wholly off grid, but it seems the way to go. And we get bombarded by TV advertisements about “how SA has seized control of generation” paid for by us poor voters. The State election can’t come soon enough.
250
Hmm. The gerrymander ‘may’ have been dealt with, but the unions are running quite a scare campaign over there, I’ve heard. I have relatives over there who praise the new hospital. Not at all sure that it’s time to count chickens just yet.
61
Greebo:
You are assuming that all is well with the new hospital. Was talking with a girl in a shop yesterday, can’t think how or why the new hospital came up, but she has a job there keeping the swing doors open for the trollies. They will open as they approach but then swing shut at the wrong time. But at least the outside doors are OK, they have the Canadian fitting that prvents snow blowing in under the door.
60
A job to keep the doors open? That’s the sort of “job” they would have had in the USSR.
51
Seized control eh? Isn’t that which usually happens AFTER the revolution?
41
As I understand it, some US states respond to this ‘off-grid’ stuff by …
wait for it…
Making it illegal to have a house that’s not connected to the grid. See here (Colorado) and here (Florida).
That’ll happen here the moment off-grid gains momentum sufficient to reduce the paydays of power company CEOs: they will then just buy some political influence, and the law will crush anyone who tries to remove these human tapeworm from their lives.
In case there is any doubt in anyone’s mind about who the political class works for: it’s not us serfs, and anyone who believes that it is should be disqualified from voting on the basis that they have the mental faculties of a four year old.
Note: being disqualified from voting should be viewed positively: I refuse to vote for those parasitic scum. I can do that because I’m a Kiwi by birth, so if the Oz AEC threaten to fine me I send them a photo of my uruwhenua with a note that reads:
(GFY: rhymes with “Go Truck Your shelf”)
30
All good, I suspect that you can have your house grid connected to stop being prosecuted, but draw no power , in which case apart from the parasitic “connection:” charge, they wont make any money from you.
I suspect as things sour, we will see civil unrest in Oz, something we havent really seen since the vietnam war days. Frankly I dont want any unrest ( and I certainly dont condone it ), I suspect that if power companies are pursuing a mercantile/profiteering approach to fleecing consumers using the gummint as its lackies, then like the infamous Poll Tax riots in the UK, it may get ugly soon…..
30
But they do make money with their availability fee. And that’s fair enough when due diligence is applied to supplying an essential service efficiently. But this casts efficiency aside.
But, think how you are going to squeal when you get the bill for your availability fee for the NBN,
10
24 Sept: TownsvilleBulletin: North Queenslanders paying for “hidden tax”
by DOMANII CAMERON
MORE than $129 million in grants has been gifted to solar projects across Central and North Queensland with Senator Matt Canavan describing the subsidies as a “hidden tax” on every resident’s power bill.
The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) has granted $129.3 million to 11 solar farms, including $9.5 million to the Whitsunday Solar Farm with another $18 million gifted to the Kennedy Energy Park//.
However, Queensland politicians and the resources industry has criticised the funding of renewable energy projects while Adani’s Carmichael coal mine is yet to attain a concessional loan, which would be paid back.
“A loan to Adani would mean taxpayers get their money back,” Senator Canavan said.
“These grants and other subsidies come right out of your back pocket through your power point at home. I don’t think people realise that.”…
Senator Canavan said renewables projects were not a long-term solution to creating jobs.
“It’s (renewables) a sugar hit,” he said.
“These projects do provide jobs in construction but there’s very few jobs long-term.
“The Clare solar farm employs five people.
“A coal-fired power station would employ hundreds.”
The Clean Energy Finance Corporation has also invested in seven North Queensland solar projects, including a $90 million loan to the Daydream Solar Farm and Hayman Solar Farm…
Adani spokesman Ron Watson said the company would not criticise any project that created energy or jobs.
“We’re a diverse energy company, we’re the owner and operator of the largest single solar site project in the world,” he said.
“We own and operate a solar factory in Mundra which is capable of producing one million solar panels a year.
“We have two solar plants about to start construction in Australia — one in Moranbah and one at Whyalla — and we have our eye on a number of other sites around Australia.”…READ ALL
http://www.townsvillebulletin.com.au/news/north-queenslanders-paying-for-hidden-tax/news-story/32981626ca5538fb7d0bdb83e8ef8b53
51
Payback costs?
Cost factors (positive and negative) include:
Price of solar water heater (more complex systems are more expensive)
Efficiency
Installation cost
Electricity used for pumping
Price of water heating fuel (e.g. gas or electricity) saved per kWh
Amount of water heating fuel used
Initial and/or recurring government subsidy
Maintenance cost (e.g. antifreeze or pump replacements)
Savings in maintenance of conventional (electric/gas/oil) water heating system
Payback times can vary greatly due to regional sun, extra cost due to frost protection needs of collectors, household hot water use etc. For instance in central and southern Florida the payback period could easily be 7 years or less rather than the 12.6 years indicated on the chart for the U.S.[46]
I disagree.
Solar panels (ignoring battery storage) will provide up to 20 years of good service, and then need replacement. So the cost should include writing off the value of the system over that period.
Then there are financing costs, interest on loan used to buy the system or loss of interest from investment of cash paid.
53
Paid cash for the solar system about 6 years ago but I am paying off the electricity bill though.
50
in regional MSM, you still find stories such as:
14 Sept: ShoreBeat, New Jersey: Fire at Brick Elementary School Traced to Solar Panel Conduit
By Daniel Nee
A small fire that forced the evacuation of Emma Havens Young Elementary School Thursday morning has been traced to a conduit unit linked to the school solar power system…
Once the conduit was disconnected, the fire stopped burning, however there was a smoke condition in the electrical room of the school and the entire building was evacuated out of an abundance of caution…
ONE COMMENT ONLY:
David Schmelz: So the school has a problem with their solar panels. And I lose Electric in Lake Riviera for three and a half hours. there is no protection from someone’s solar panels to the grid. Their problem took out 1500 home. Something just doesn’t sound right.
http://brick.shorebeat.com/2017/09/fire-at-brick-elementary-school-traced-to-solar-conduit-panel/
a different kind of problem:
18 Sept: CBS6 Albany NY: Solar panels slow down fire crews working another suspicious fire
by Anne McCloy|
Chief Tom Garrett says firefighters battled extreme heat and the solar panels on top slowed them down.
“When they arrived they didn’t know if they were energized or not, so it caused us some problems,” Garrett said…
wonder how this is going?
12 Jul: Australian: Greg Brown: ‘Years to understand’ fire risk of solar power systems
Victoria’s Metropolitan Fire Brigade has responded to more than 40 fires caused by home solar power systems in the past five years and warned that it would take years to understand the fire risk posed by lithium ion battery storage.
The MFB said the solar installations were vulnerable to faults across their systems, including isolation switches, inverters and installed wiring, and from deteriorating components.
The alarming figures come as the solar battery storage industry pushes to kill new regulations that would force homeowners to build a separate “fire bunker” housing for battery installations…
Under draft rules released by Standards Australia, lithium ion batteries are classed as “Fire Class 1” and would not be allowed inside or within 1m of a domestic dwelling. The industry will have until August 15 to respond to the draft regulations.
The safety moves are designed to avoid a repeat of Labor’s insulation batts scheme in which the rapid rollout of roof insulation in 2009 led to more than 200 house fires across the nation, and ultimately four deaths.
The MFB warned last night that the risk caused by the rapidly growing uptake of solar panels on homes had not yet been properly understood…
Energy Safe Victoria director Neil Fraser said at least eight solar panel models had been taken off the market in the past five years because of fire concerns.
“We are aware of as many as eight recalls nationally over the last five years of DC isolator switches which are located next to the solar panel on the roof,” Mr Fraser said.
“It is important that those people who have panels maintain them. They need to be cleaned regularly and inspected, preferably by a licensed electrician.”…
A spokesman for Victorian Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio said the industry was heavily regulated and the fire risk from solar panels was ***not high.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/years-to-understand-fire-risk-of-solar-power-systems/news-story/bcb237fc4e13e3cf37e56cadfaf44430
***not high? not low?
71
25 Sept: LiveMint: Used Chinese solar panels set off quality fears
The used Chinese solar panels, which have an average efficiency of 16-22%, are being sold at on discounted prices and carry a one-year warranty
by Utpal Bhaskar
New Delhi: In what has caught the Indian solar industry by surprise, used Chinese solar modules—the rectangular panels often seen on rooftops—are being sold in the domestic market at a discount. Once installed in China, they are now being offered to Indian developers, said several people aware of the development…
“We were offered these modules at a substantial discount of as low as 25 cents per watt on cost, insurance and freight (c.i.f) basis. It was claimed that these were used A-grade solar panels which were installed at the seller’s plant site for just two months,” said a person requesting anonymity…
With the average efficiency of a solar panel usually just 16-22%, sub-standard quality will impact generation…
India has also been conducting an anti-dumping investigation on solar equipment from China, Taiwan and Malaysia.
India’s newly appointed power and new and renewable energy minister Raj Kumar Singh at an event on Friday evening here said that their have been reports of dumping from certain countries at prices which are below manufacturing cost.
“Once we are convinced we will ask for anti-dumping duty,” said Singh…
http://www.livemint.com/Politics/34KhvmUEDdGnEd0q4M7aiL/Used-Chinese-solar-panels-set-off-quality-fears.html
24 Sept: New Indian Express: Double whammy for indian solar firms, prices to soar
By Jonathan Ananda
CHENNAI: The US International Trade Commission’s (USITC) determination on Friday that cheap imports (primarily from China) of photovoltaic (PV) modules are hurting United States’ manufacturers is set to make life even harder for Indian solar firms, already struggling with high prices in an import-dependent market. According to analysts and industry players, the panel’s findings are set to kick-off a buying spree among US developers to buy as much stock as they can before the panel makes a recommendation to restrict such imports. The 4-0 vote by the International Trade Commission sets up a two-month review period in which the panel must recommend a remedy to US President Donald Trump.
The expected rush for panels will push prices of solar modules even higher, with some ongoing projects likely to risk escalation. “The situation is not very rosy. If prices go up by a little more, we will have to recalculate costs for a few ongoing projects and, consequently, solar tariffs might arrest their downward trend,” admitted a project head for an ongoing solar park project in South India. The US panel’s findings are only the final straw. Over the past few months, Indian developers have been battling a sharp rise in prices of solar modules. The rapidly rising demand in China has led Chinese manufacturers to divert supply, some reportedly going as far as to insist on renegotiation of supply contracts to Indian players in order to factor in rising prices.
According to a report from industry tracker Bridge to India, the country’s top three solar module suppliers are Chinese. “There has been a marginal increase in the market share of Indian manufacturers but the Chinese suppliers continue to hold over 80 per cent of the total market share,” said the report
According to ICRA, imported PV module prices have been rising over the past 3-4 months, by as much as 15 per cent. “Such pricing pressure, if sustained over the next 3-6 months, will adversely impact the viability of recently bid solar power projects, where bid tariff is below `3.5 per unit,” Majumdar had observed. A six cent per watt jump in PV module prices are estimated to increase capital costs by as much as 11 per cent…
http://www.newindianexpress.com/business/2017/sep/23/double-whammy-for-indian-solar-firms-prices-to-soar-1661723.html
30
Thinking strategically for personal home electricity supply I have been looking into a solar system that would heat the electric hot water tank, provide electricity for refrigerators and caravan/boat battery maintenance and other appliances during daylight hours, primarily 10 am to 2 pm, and minimal before and after those best four hours, with electric forklift truck second-hand lead acid batteries storage.
I have a 3.5 Kva portable petrol generator in the shed where the batteries would be located and the shed is wired back to the house where the switchboard and meters are located.
And going off the electricity grid.
Administration charges are the greater portion of electricity bills now.
And use LPG bottle BBQ and single burner canister gas cooker for general purposes, electric stove and oven daytime only.
But reaching this stage is simply ridiculous in our developed country where we used to take the reliable and cheap electricity grid for granted.
142
That’s pretty much how I’ve been planning mine only hot water to be heated by gas because
A – I’ve already got the two systems in place , and
B- can’t beat instant gas hot water especially if you control the heat via touch pad , because then you only need one tap .
40
Dennis,
Your system sounds very like the system that my Grandfather installed on his farm in 1936. He had a Ronaldson-Tippett engine and generator and battery storage. The generator had to be started by hand cranking and ran for several hours in the early evening. After that they had batteries for lighting and then went to bed early. Cooking and hot water were provided by the wood stove.
He put on mains power as soon as he could at great expense. The Power line runs for about 2/3 kilometre to the main power line on the main road.. The SWER (single wire earth return) system is still in place after about 70 years.
110
Maybe move into the caravan: just add solar panels and take portable generator. Air conditioning, gas and electric hot water system, bathroom, washing machine, microwave, refrigerator, gas and electric stove-grille, LED lighting, built-in battery charger for vehicle or 240V automatic maintenance charging, double glazing and insulated?
We could all become a nation of gypsies.
102
Yeah…stupid that we have to camp in our own homes, because some make-believe UN invented nonsense is messing us up….
It gunna get ugly…..you cant stop it. Good thing the powers that be have basically dictatorial powers and indefinte detention to lock us all down if need be and we get to just smile and take it ….
No I shant go there….
10
Crisis time, Australian Industry Group claim;
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-25/government-needs-to-act-now-to-prevent-gas-shortfall-says-aig/8986170
22
Am I right in thinking that solar hot water is obtained by simply heating water held in black painted tubes during the day hours? To be used in the evening for showering etc. Why does one need to generate electricity if hot water is all that is required.
50
That would be a very simplified version of how it works but yes that’s basically it , electricity is needed for other things in the house though .
50
Are you are in a frost zone?
20
Frost is NOT a problem unless the system is pressurised, if the tank is just an open tank with a float valve then the water will expand/contract as it likes. All this means is that you need a small pressure pump on the outlet.
32
I had a discussion with a plumber about this 15 years ago, he said that in areas where there are freezing temps, they use glycol. He described such places as frost zones, Most pipes do not take well to freezing, a common problem in Northern NY where I live. PEX pipe can tolerate freezing though.
00
I was thinkinhg I wasnt going to post this weekend, but when people provide gifts this big, I just cant resist…..who would like to take this one?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-25/the-truth-about-soaring-power-prices/8979860
“The truth about soaring power prices: wind and solar not to blame
Separate events, different states, alternate days.
Between them, however, competition kahuna Rod Sims and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull last week demolished an old chestnut about renewable energy: it is not the cause for the recent spike in electricity prices.
In fact, according to both, it has had very little impact.
For the past decade or more, we’ve been bombarded with the message from a vocal but powerful minority within Parliament and the broader community that the switch to renewable energy has made Australia uncompetitive, crippled our industry and driven power prices higher.
The real issue is that, fundamentally, they don’t believe climate change is real or that humans have adversely affected the planet.
Having spent so long denying science and rejecting the overwhelming body of evidence, they’re now being forced to ignore economics; that renewables have become a cheaper longer term power source.
Coal is the future, they argue.
That’s simply not a view shared by the power generators, whose primary motivation is to turn a profit and stay in business, or the banks who must finance them.
Nor is it a view shared by BHP, the nation’s biggest company that built a large part of its wealth on coal exports.
Last week, it confirmed it was reviewing its membership of the Minerals Council of Australia because of “materially different positions” on issues such as a Clean Energy Target and climate change.
Technical innovation around renewable energy generation has seen costs plummet.
So much so that US investment bank Goldman Sachs — hardly a standard bearer for radical ideology — now argues that, rather than pushing power costs higher, renewable energy is the cheapest form of power generation. More on that later…”
Yes indeed….
92
When retreating try to slow the enemy down
102
Oh Ok then Steve, great, since it’s so cheap we can lift the subsidies now, thanks for playing.
50
Hazelwood closed at the end of March, electricity prices have risen 10.93% in 12 months. Coincidence?
90
A rough estimate for my solo occupied home is that a solar hot water system saves between 25% and 33% of a quarterly power bill, depending on the amount of hot water used. The repayment time appears to be roughly 7 to 8 years for the investment in a solar hot water system. During the aftermath of cyclone Marcia here in Rockhampton, I had warm water showers and warm water everyday until the power was restored. Power restoration took 5 days to bring it back online. Persons who had solar panels with no battery storage, i.e. DC to AC Inverter into the grid, had no power like the rest of us as the damage to the local power grids neutralised their solar systems.
So no advantage was gained by the many persons who had solar panels, they were in black out with the rest of us until the power distribution was repaired. Possibly a similar system failure as in S.A..No battery storage at home ment no power until grid repaired. We did have one enterprising clown with to much financial means who wired a generator into his house without isolating it from the grid. Something the power authorities cautioned people about was to isolate their power system from the grid if they did run their homes on a power generator. When the linesman crews closed the circuit breakers the diesel generator died horribly as well as some of the power transformers in the local distribution grid. One hell of a power frequency mismatch and short circuit. The character who had wired the generator into his house without isolating it from the grid was not popular. A further delay of 18 to 24 hours for repair crews to replace the damaged transformers. One can install a backup generator to come online automatically with a short delay when the mains power fails but requires high voltage power detection systems on the mains to avoid damage to the backup generator and the mains power system. A expensive proposition to the average home owner.
The moral to the story is that early thoughts, from 20 to 30 years ago, on solar panels for domestic use were to be backed by batteries and hence make the user “off the grid”. But that was expensive then, as is now for most home owners. Even in remote areas where solar panels were used to power homesteads, a backup standby diesel generator with sufficient power wattage output was provided. This to power everything and to even recharge the batteries, when there was prolonged cloudy and weather periods with low solar generation from the solar cells.
The sums of money being touted by the pundits to supply backup power to the grid by large battery systems are in a very little universe of their own. S.A is only installing some to back up the grid for about one hour or so? The money would be better spent on a standby gas turbine generator. Which the Swanbank station E system in Qld is. And is currently feeding 385 Mega Watts into the eastern power supply corridor link to the Southern states. Station E has been available since commissioning in 2002. Fifteen years as a power grid support.
70
DO, my estimate down here in Melbourne is that my solar hot water system does not save any power at all; in fact it consumes power as it is needlessly pumping through the day when there is no hot water usage. Our home usage is in the morning and in the evening only.
40
Your solar hot water pump needs a sensor fitting that shuts down the pump when the heated water temperature is below a set level.
30
Above a certain level?
10
D.O.
A local restaurant has a 13.5kVa diesel generator fitted with automatic start. Largish battery store needed. The whole thing fitted by an electrical firm and so sure to have an isolator from the grid when starting and running.
Cost was built into the system but if you want that sort of starter it is $1000 (plus cost of batteries etc.)
20
Odd graph. 3 hours missing and large discontinuity from 11pm to 1am. In fact the highest consumption is at 1am?
40% higher than 11pm and even higher than 7pm?
Perhaps Adelaide is in the grand final and this was all replays of the match with Geelong?
Or Jay Weatherill left the lights on in parliament? Odd because nobody’s home.
90
2 hours.
41
I wondered about that also. How come the highest consumption is a 1am? According to Tony from Oz that should be about a low point.
60
Why is it higher at 1am?
When the city stops at roughly midnight – all go into clean & shut mode!
The city shuts down.
Restaurants shut and then the dishwashers start.
The pubs & clubs clean and later switch off lights and everything
The good folks finishing their night go home wash, clean and then go to bed
The lifts in buildings etc stop getting used
The manufacturers like Lysaght have shift changes at midnight – then ramp up with the next shift
The corner stores start closing after the pub trade finishes
The Servos wind down with taxis etc off the road
Hospitals start sleeping after the accidents & drunks stop coming in
The wharfies stop there shifts at midnight and ramp up again!
Woolies and Coles deliveries finish at midnight, so massive stocking of fridges etc
A/C’s getting turned off after the rush everywhere!
All of the Commercial, Industrial & Residential have a night shift change!
Just my thoughts on why!
50
Perhaps it is the overnight tariff switching on the hot water systems – as ours is programmed to turn on some where around midnight – cannot remember the exact time – 23:45 rings a bell, but it is not AFAIK able to adjust for daylight saving time (hence they may actually be around 00:45. Hence all will turn on at about the same time, so there will be a massive load, but gradually drop off over a few hours as each tank gets to its set temperature.
In the UK the person responsible for keeping the grid fed from various sources watches TV, so when one of their soapies ends, a few million turn on the kettles for a cup of tea. Even a million households turning on their kettles will require a giga Watt or 2 for a few minutes, and if I recall correctly they use pumped storage as one of their main sources for that. I am open to correction.
50
Probably a dumb question but does this mean wind was earning approx $80/MWh in LGCs minus the $44/MWh negative price at 6 AM?
30
So far I’ve only gotten to “every day in the last year was worse” and looking forward to the rest.
30
The blue and yellow graph is good up to a point, but it doesn’t indicate carrying costs for the baseload generation when it is excluded from the market by “renewables”.
That unpaid churn time costs big bucks and No wonder AGL was making an issue out of that recently.
That is not a market.
KK
70
My plan is to electrify the office with solar now I’ve installed gas for cooking. With good lighting, cooking and enough power for laptop and internet things can go on.
But like others I’m ashamed for Australia under Green Blob. We were never a “lucky country” except in the mind of some living national treasure (ie pompous, dreary intellectual). We made our luck from make-do and have-a-go. Europeans came here to live, we went to Europe to visit. Which should tell you a lot. We were materialists so we wouldn’t lack material, we were innovative because there was nobody to show us old ways and we were conservative because things needed to work and work in a hurry. Literacy, numeracy and hygiene existed in places where you would expect to find isolated brutes.
What I’m saying is: Australians have rocked.
Only now are we becoming dependent on luck. Will the sun shine? Will the wind blow? Will our smelter finish its run? Will the water run out? Cross fingers. Here’s hoping we’re lucky today. Maybe if we burn some incense to Gaia…
Donald Horne’s patronising characterisation is at last coming true.
90
You introduce our Living National Treasures there mosomoso.
Who shall we nominate as our most useless National Treasure. I don’t actually know who they are but I will nominate Mungo MacCallum ( he lives in the Green Shire of Byron Bay)
70
There’s actually an official list, determined by the National Trust. Seems to have been inspired by the Japanese custom of declaring certain traditional artisans like bowmakers, potters, papermakers, calligraphers etc to be national treasures. The Japanese treasures are actually an interesting lot.
In Australia it’s a nauseating exercise in PC and celeb culture. Hilarious when they had to sin-bin Marcus Einfeld and Rolf Harris. And can someone tell the National Trust that Rusty Crowe has never been an Australian?
Whoever builds our first new A-USC coal power plant will be my number one treasure, even if it’s a drover’s dog with scrofula.
70
But can Rusty Crowe run for parliament.
30
Mosomo
I am shocked.
That big second paragraph is so real and accurate and describes where we have come from.
My grandfather and father were plumbers but after returning from New Guinea following WW11 my father was a wreck and did not continue with plumbing.
The point being we were far from rich.
What we did have, however, was a fantastic education organised by the government.
I often look back and ask where else in the world could a poor but honest person get the same education that was given to me and those around me.
I look at the pseudo education available now in schools and universities and feel very uneasy and disappointed.
How have we gone in 50 years from being a country where everyone who had the ability and work ethic could get a world class education to now where our politicians fail to lead and we now rank behind West Kyrgyzstan in international school rankings.
My apologies to West Kyrgyzstan but we are now in a mess that is confusing and leaderless.
We need to find a leader who can “make Australia rock again”.
It is sad to see so much talent in Australia without a true leader.
KK
121
Not just an education of facts KK but of a history and development of our own blend of monarchy, democracy and republic that was moulded into a nation of genuine pioneering spirit, perhaps in those golden years there was an almost perfect mix of everything that the rest of the world offered that we somehow happened across.
70
As Mosomo says in that second paragraph, we were a make do nation, and if I might add, one that didn’t whine and whinge about imaginary injustices.
There is far less pollution in my home city now than when I was a kid 60 years ago.
That we now have governments that operate in fantasy mode and trade on the image of a “lucky country” that only existed for some of the elites, is dispiriting.
We weren’t lucky, we were just very disciplined and worked hard.
KK
80
I have sometimes thought that we were in the 1950s and 60s the perfect socialist state.
It worked for a while, then leadership changed and we lost the plot.
30
The internet has been a significant disruptor to the Elite, which is why every mug mercantile “govt” has tried to filter and control it, and why meta data laws were introduced so anyone could be “strung up” by the powers that be as a not so subtle threat of coming down on anyone who doesnt toe the line.
Australians are innovators, so it shouldn’t take too long for them to work out how to get around the censorship and create energy tech that will shatter the the gas/electricity stranglehold. From what Ive heard, its close….
30
They had a name for it.
Protestant Work Ethic.
20
No no no…in the new australia, everyone spends all their time on social media, talking about their feelings and not learning how to make or maintain stuff…that way we become a nation of soft boofheads who are fully depenedent on the inept and/or predatory gummint of the day…
Smile and enjoy your self-inflicted slavery, Australia….
( a great show is “Black Mirror” on Netflix – its a ruthless labotomy of modern society and is no holds barred – just avoid the first episode – you need a very strong stomach for that one… )
10
But look on the bright side everyone will know how to Virtue Signal…
10
KK, just think of the innovative ways we used new technologies to educate and provide other services as soon as those technologies became available. You could master Latin or Maths in Bullamakanka with only the flies for company. Flynn was working with both radio and emergency flights by the mid-1920s. What a country. What a people.
61
Yes, but in terms of leadership we seem to be drowning in self pity.
Too many people are encouraged to feel that they have been wronged and this is unhealthy for our future.
KK
60
Yes, because no one puts a rocket up young people and verbally drill them so they harden up and take responsibility….everythng is the Leftist “Victim” culture now where no one gets blamed and everyone is a victim…in short, its a society in self inflicted paralysis.
Get rid of PC – its an aggressive cancer upon all our houses.
20
We had weekly sessions of radio of the air.
It now seems like a funny name but it was “innovative”.
30
KK,
Where did you go to primary school? You say PNG but town and dates?
40
Hi Peter,
Some clarification, my father was in New Britain, Thursday island and Wewak during the war.
He came home with large chunks of skin peeling of his hands and feet.
I went to school here in Newcastle but many years later I did something really weird, I went to New Guinea.
It happened because a student at Goroka teachers college wrote to Newcastle university and asked if they had someone who wanted to experience life in his home village.
I jumped and went up there just after Christmas 1969 for a month.
His village was inland about half way between Aitape and Wewak. The airstrip at Nuku was an experience where although it had plenty of length it seemed to be about 20 degrees off being level.
That was a long time ago.
KK
40
Thanks KK,
My own experiences during my primary school years were; Wau, Madang, Rabaul and Port Moresby. I also visited Lae and Mt Hagen.
20
I can still remember my first and only taste of bouai. After watching the old ladies eating it I was given one , bit into it and immediately felt as though I had drunk 10 beers. Nearly took my head off. First and last.
10
The 17th September demand and supply components give a good indication of how the whole network can collapse. Most of those solar systems have limited stabilising features. They have coarse control limits that are essentially protection overrides so just shut down.
It will not be too far off and AEMO will need to limit additional solar connections in SA. That will actually force more people to disconnect completely. So the grid is getting more complex to manage; power prices are going up and more consumers will leave the grid. It would not surprise me to see the wind limit lowered from the present 1200MW level as more rooftop solar is connected.
The SA network is close to toast. All that expensive generation plu storage and no customers.
The 20th century was one of centralisation and consolidation in the grid. The 21st century will be one of decontralisation and eventual disintegration of the NEM. THe NEM provides no value.
On a technical note my 5kWh battery with its dedicated off-grid load has missed one day in 4 winters now. Most days the battery gets fully charged. In summer the battery is fully charged by 10am summer time. It needs 1 hour full sunshine equivalent to recharge. So there is huge excess potential energy in summer. I have been using an electric heater that I switch over in October through May to use some of that potential energy. So households no fitting large solar systems can easily upset the grid. New developments in Melbourne have to be designed for generation capacity not load. So the peak output through the daytime in these locations is higher than the evening peaks.
No one has thought it through. The grid is DEAD. SA first – which state is next?
41
“The grid is DEAD. SA first – which state is next?”
Flip a coin. Perhaps a big comeback for modular nuclear. Also those Toshiba\Westinghouse AP1000 Are still a thing of beauty. Perfect for your local Aluminum smelter. I wonder what Tony’s remarks are on Nuke vs Coal\HELE, if you must have base power and use most of it yourself? Can’t the Aluminum guys go into idle (just to keep from going solid); for external sales to the grid when profitable?
All the best!-will-
20
Will,
Australia has many attributes that would make it excel hosting a vertically integrated nuclear industry….except the political drive.
20
“….except the political drive.”
Do you think your political drive folk will ever do something useful; for the competent folk in AU? Why would they?
From old stories your original zentral AU has a solution! Huge vessel with lightly salted boiling water. Immerse said ‘political drive folk’ until tender. Close enough if your hogs consider them tender. 🙂
10
A big smelter could have 4 potlines with 250 pots in each line. Each pot could have 20 prebaked anodes each weighing about 1 tonne. Each anode has a life around 20 days. The logistics involved in adjusting anode height and replacing maybe 1000 anodes per day is a significant part of operating a smelter. It is possible to operate at reduced throughput but it is destabilising to the whole logistics of the operation as well as the process control in the pots.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26byo1fVkM0
There is not a lot of people running around modern hotlines to sort things out of the process gets out of step:
http://primary.world-aluminium.org/fileadmin/user_upload/primary/large/large_reduction_3.jpg
Older plants that use Soderberg pots are easier to turn down. The Kitimat smelter in BC has a 1GW hydroelectric plant that could make more income sending power into US west coast market than making aluminium some years ago now. The operation got quite good at placing lines into hibernation or even shutting them down for months at time to reduce power demand at the smelter.
20
At the core of all this is what seems to be a deliberate running down of the modern grid.
The issue is that with reliable power we humans can thrive, which seems to be anathema to those who would rather see our industrilaized civilization collapse. It seems the most logical answer. Place a few bobble-head easily replaceable pollies as the front men, burn them to achieve the result, and hide the real agenda that way.
This is whyt getting angry at pollies, unles syou can force them to back track, is pointless – they are just canon fodder. The trick is to find who are giveing them the pollies their orders, and expose *those* people. A cesspool is only disinfected by direct illumination from exposure to sunlight….
30
Good one: find the black hand.
10
It’s a big cesspool to expose.
10
Rickwill, you are wrong! the grid is not dead and will be around long after your batteries expire.
People using solar panels are in my opinion acting out of pure self interest. (Bugger those who can’t afford afford a rooftop system). The government subsidies for rooftop should be stopped as of now. The system is totally inequitable.
Furthermore the same people ie those with rooftop solar should pay to use the grid for offloading their excess power!
Regards GeoffW
01
Does anybody if the Victorian Government has the right to switch off the SA interconnect, or is that right held by AEMO?
40
Context – South Australia consumes 6.2% of Australia’s power.
Tony.
60
Unless I’m mistaken; SA has nett metering on most of their roof top solar so all that yellow bulge on the graph is in effect supplied to the grid at retail price to be redeemed by peak consumption or a credit to the households. It is a business model that will send retailers broke. The cost line on the graph shows wholesale price but they will have to buy the yellow bulge on top of that.
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Creative accounting method Socialism, Green Chapter.
60
So at lunch time the price paid for energy dips? No, this is not the price you pay. It is the buy price the electricity companies pay. The subsidy peaks, the cash grab peaks.
Remember for wind and solar, with the RET add $90Mwhr at wholesale (possibly double at retail).
This makes it the highest retail price of the day by far.
You do not get any energy for that peak money. The cash goes to wind producers who sell you electricity from windmills for which you paid previously. You are being charged double, a Ponzi scheme called a subsidy. You pay cash for the windmills and solar panels and you pay again when they generate electricity, even if you do not use it.
The people who received the cash from you, whether you live in Cairns or Perth get to charge the rest of the country for the electricity they produce. Payment for the actual electricity is in addition to this.
We really need the record of wind contribution at 1pm and 4am. To draw the retail price.
I am puzzled at the ‘demand’ curve which peaks at a ridiculous 1am and hardly changes during the day, assuming you do add blue and red together. This is a very dodgy curve.
The data at 1am needs explanation. That’s a huge party.
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TdeF,
I’m guessing the demand curve includes wind power exported to Victoria, then around 5.30 the interconector dropped off for an hour. It’s a Sunday, lots of churches :-). On the AEMO site 1000-1500MW is pretty normal.
Separately, the RET for small scale is paid on installation, calculated at a lower rate than the large scale certificates but calculated assuming 15years output. It is generally taken off the installation cost by the installer. Any feed-in or nett meter credits are on top as cream on the gravy train(excuse the mixed metaphors).
30
From memory, I think SA has to have a set minimum spinning reserve, even when there’s plenty of wind so AEMO would export the electricity to Victoria.
40
Also I cannot think why Victoria (83% is Melbourne) does with this power at 1.30am. Maybe the aluminium smelter at Portland? I thought 75% was out of action since the last blackout froze the pots.
30
All those supermarket freezers and your own. All cold stores. Public lighting. High rise air circulation and conditioning. Trains and trams may still be going. Any 24/7 processing – there are still light industry operating.
20
RobK. Yes, that’s calculated on 15 years carbon tax in advance. I have not gone into how they calculate it but the money comes from the public, not the government. That way it is not a tax. Clever.
What happens is that it was to be paid to the owner but the installer usually gets the customer to sign the money over, so at present roughly half of the price is paid by the levy on everyone’s electricity bills. In advance. I presume the installer makes a gross profit as well, as does everyone in the supply chain.
Then there is a multi year CO2 debt for manufacture of solar cells which has to be added, so this is a carbon tax in advance for something which generated years of CO2 in the manufacture. The world will not be better of for 15+5=20 years, if at all. Then this ‘renewables’ system, paid 50%+ by everyone with the feed in income, will need replacing. I think this is why they are called renewables. We will have to pay again.
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Drivel from the ABC about renewbles not being a problem ala Pat
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-25/the-truth-about-soaring-power-prices/8979860
The truth about soaring power prices: wind and solar not to blame
Separate events, different states, alternate days.
Between them, however, competition kahuna Rod Sims and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull last week demolished an old chestnut about renewable energy: it is not the cause for the recent spike in electricity prices.
In fact, according to both, it has had very little impact.
For the past decade or more, we’ve been bombarded with the message from a vocal but powerful minority within Parliament and the broader community that the switch to renewable energy has made Australia uncompetitive, crippled our industry and driven power prices higher.
The real issue is that, fundamentally, they don’t believe climate change is real or that humans have adversely affected the planet.
Having spent so long denying science and rejecting the overwhelming body of evidence, they’re now being forced to ignore economics; that renewables have become a cheaper longer term power source.
Coal is the future, they argue.
Coal-fired generators have no future here
Much of the debate about our future power generation has become mired in political point scoring and simplistic arguments designed to inflame and outrage, writes Ian Verrender.
That’s simply not a view shared by the power generators, whose primary motivation is to turn a profit and stay in business, or the banks who must finance them.
Nor is it a view shared by BHP, the nation’s biggest company that built a large part of its wealth on coal exports.
Last week, it confirmed it was reviewing its membership of the Minerals Council of Australia because of “materially different positions” on issues such as a Clean Energy Target and climate change.
Technical innovation around renewable energy generation has seen costs plummet.
So much so that US investment bank Goldman Sachs — hardly a standard bearer for radical ideology — now argues that, rather than pushing power costs higher, renewable energy is the cheapest form of power generation. More on that later.
See what our readers had to say on the increasing power prices.
The truth about the power price spike
As the theatre over keeping open the creaking Liddell coal-fired power station in NSW’s Hunter Valley played an encore last week, the ACCC boss and the PM delivered a few sobering nuggets.
First, there was Rod Sims at the National Press Club in Canberra on Wednesday: “Forty-one per cent of the increase in electricity prices over the last 10 years has been in network costs and we keep forgetting that.”
He went on: “Those poles and wires that run down your street are the main reason you are paying too much for your electricity.”
Media player: “Space” to play, “M” to mute, “left” and “right” to seek.
VIDEO: Rod Sims addressed the National Press Club on “Australia’s Gas and Electricity Affordability Problem” (National Press Club)
According to Mr Sims, extra retail charges account for 24 per cent of the higher prices while higher generation costs as a result of a failure to invest make up 19 per cent of the price hikes.
Green energy initiatives contribute just 16 per cent to the recent price hikes.
On Thursday in Brisbane, responding to questions, the PM concurred, explaining that “particularly for retail customers, the largest single part of your bill is the network costs.”
“That’s the poles and wires basically,” he said.
Gas, not coal, will fix prices
The short-term fix to Australia’s soaring electricity prices is to fix the gas crisis, but long-term fix it’s greater investment in renewables and energy storage, writes Ian Verrender.
But then he elaborated on the more immediate issues, particularly around generation and the changes that have been foisted upon consumers.
“In terms of the green schemes, they do have a cost but it is a relatively small cost,” he said.
“Gas is the biggest single fact at this point in time.”
What does gas have to do with it? As the PM explained, the electricity price is set by the last generator to come into the stack.
It’s what economists call the marginal cost of production. You might be to meet half the demand at low price. But it is the expensive bit at the end that determines how much a producer will charge everyone.
When it comes to electricity, gas is that last final element.
“It is peaking power,” the PM said. “The increase in the gas price has increased the cost of electricity.”
The gas debacle
Gas prices haven’t just increased. They have quadrupled.
And the tragedy is that Australia, with one of the greatest reserves of gas on the planet, now charges its households and businesses far more to use that energy than the countries to which we export.
Gas forgotten in energy debate
As politicians continue trading barbs over the merits of renewable energy versus coal-fired power generation, missing from the debate these days has been the role of gas.
With the continued reversal of policy on carbon pricing and climate change, the unofficial industry consensus was to build solar and wind generation with gas-fired back-up to shore up reliability; a decision affirmed by the chief scientist Alan Finkel in his report on how to cope with future challenges.
But three major export terminals were built at Curtis Island just off Gladstone in Queensland, with Santos building a plant that required far more gas than to which it had access.
To fulfil its export contracts, it began sourcing gas previously destined for the domestic market.
That forced the price of domestic gas sky high just as a global glut sent international prices crashing.
It’s now cheaper to buy Australian gas in Asia. A fortnight ago, gas from West Australia’s giant Gorgon project was sold to India at $8.70 a gigajoule. East coast gas sells here for $17.50.
That’s why the Federal Government has shanghaied gas producers like Santos to direct export gas back into the local market.
If Australians could get the same deal on our gas that Indians have secured, our electricity would be much cheaper.
Renewables or coal: What is the cheapest?
A line chart showing the price of LCOE dropping dramatically since 1983.
A line graph projecting that costs of LCOE solar will continue falling 2009-2025.
When it comes to cost, coal lobbyists usually refer to the subsidies doled out to the renewable sector to argue the industry wouldn’t exist if it had to stand on its own.
That’s a valid point. But it overlooks two things; the vast billions handed out to the coal industry and the increasing competitiveness of renewables.
Every coal fired generator in Australia was built, not just partially subsidised, entirely with taxpayer funds.
When they were privatised, many were given state owned coal mines with contract prices way below market, effectively a further subsidy.
Then there are the health costs.
A health study in the Latrobe Valley last year identified much higher respiratory and asthma admissions to hospital than the Victorian average while life expectancy was significantly lower than the state average.
But it is the cost of energy generation where the game really is changing.
As the Goldman Sachs graphs above show, renewable energy costs have plunged by up to 70 per cent since 2009 and will be the cheapest form of generation in Europe this year and in the US within eight years on a levelised cost basis.
When the cost of installation is taken into account, however, the story changes.
A bar chart that shows wind and solar are the cheapest ways of producing electricity.
PHOTO: When the cost of installation is taken into account, wind and solar are much cheaper. (Goldman Sachs)
Wind and solar are much cheaper. Not only is the fuel free and faces no regulatory risk — in the form of a carbon price — but the technology is simpler and quicker to install.
Australia’s chief scientist Alan Finkel went one step further. He factored the extra costs of adding gas or battery backup to ensure stability or baseload power in the system.
Wind still came out cheapest, with solar only marginally more expensive than black coal.
The Finkel review, explained
Confused by what the Finkel reivew was, what it calls for and what that means? Technology reporter Jake Sturmer explains.
Renewable plants can be built within one to three years while coal-fired plants take between four and seven years to build.
Putting aside arguments about climate change, the main problem with coal-fired electricity is that the numbers no longer stack up.
It’s too expensive, it has much higher regulatory risks and renewable technology is rapidly advancing.
It will take more than a taxpayer subsidy to build one here. It will need a full taxpayer handout. And it will result in more expensive power bills.
Coal is simply a form of stored solar energy. New technology has delivering cleaner, more efficient and cheaper ways to directly harvest solar energy to power our lives.
Don’t expect that innovation to stop.
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Also remember that Adelaide, Perth and Sydney are on the same latitude, the sunniest settled latitude in Australia. Adelaide is the sunniest. So you build the solar there. Then you get 9c kw/hr for the electricity if sold and even 9c kw/hr just for producing it. Plus Government backed low interest loans to help you build the systems or cash grants to customers for home solar.
So you build this with public money and charge the poor who cannot afford solar for the mere fact of production and again for the actual production. All government guaranteed. I am surprised there is anything but private solar for the public service middle class in South Australia. At night you can afford to buy cheap electricity from Victoria, unless the wind is blowing and the money is flowing from publicly funded windmills.
Who needs to work in South Australia? All WA’s GST money, submarines with 30 years to build them and RET money flowing like rivers plus a desalination plant which no one ever needed. A dream state, literally. As long as the Greens control the Senate, the fantasy will continue.
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As bobl says, solar hot water makes sense.
There is no double handling as with pv rooftop solar.
We had it installed over 30 years ago and our power bills dropped significantly with a reasonable payback period.
40
anything but coal…more consequences:
24 Sept: Japan Today: Japan fires up biomass energy, but fuel shortage looms
By Yuka Obayashi
As the sun sets on Japan’s solar energy boom, companies and investors are rushing into wood-burning biomass projects to lock in still-high government subsidies.
More than 800 projects have already won government approval, offering 12.4 gigawatts (GW) of capacity — equal to 12 nuclear power stations and nearly double Japan’s 2030 target for biomass in its basic energy policy.
The sheer number of projects has raised questions about how they will all find sufficient fuel, mostly shipped in from countries like Canada and Vietnam, while some experts question the environmental credentials of such large-scale plants.
The projects approved to date that use general wood fuel would need the equivalent of up to 60 million tonnes of wood pellets, compared with global output of 24 million tonnes in 2014, said Takanobu Aikawa, a senior researcher at Japan’s Renewable Energy Institute.
Other fuels such as local forest thinned woods or palm kernel shells from Indonesia and Malaysia would not make up the shortfall, he said.
“There will be a scramble for fuels as countries like China and South Korea are looking to expand biomass power,” he said.
Biomass plants generate energy by burning fuels, releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. They qualify as renewable because plants absorb CO2 as they grow, with a lifespan of years rather than the millions of years needed to make fossil fuels such as coal.
Echoing a similar surge in solar a few years ago, biomass applications jumped before an April rule change that requires an applicant to have a contract with a utility for grid connection, and the rush has continued ahead of a cut in the feed-in-tariff (FIT) on offer for large plants.
As with solar, companies that win early approval keep generous FITs for up to 20 years, while late-comers miss out. The solar FIT has been nearly halved since 2012, bringing the sector’s boom to an abrupt halt…
Japan Renewable Energy (JRE), in which Goldman Sachs has a stake, is building its first biomass power station north of Tokyo, adding to solar and wind power plants…
Solar surged seven-fold in just four years to be about halfway to its 7 pct target, but new projects stalled after the FIT cuts, leading to bankruptcies among small contractors and suppliers…READ ALL
https://japantoday.com/category/business/Japan-fires-up-biomass-energy-but-fuel-shortage-looms
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It is unbelievable that so called biomass can be put up as a “clean” fuel when compared to coal it is very dirty.
This fact can be established through simple lab analysis.
The world has gone mad.
60
25 Sept: Australian: Farmer may be gone with the wind farm and do a blade runner
by Samantha Hutchinson
Paul Lewis just wants a good night’s sleep.
More than three years since the largest wind farm in the southern hemisphere sprang up on his back fence, the sheep and cattle farmer considers himself lucky if he has a night when he isn’t woken by the sound of turning blades.
Now with a slew of new wind farms planned around his town of Hawkesdale, 300km west of Melbourne, and impending changes to Victorian state planning policy, Mr Lewis is seriously pondering his future.
“Everyone thinks these things are great, but they’re not the ones living beside them and getting woken up at night,” he said.
“It’s got to the point that … if any more of them go up then we’ll just have to move out.”…
The Andrews Labor government has been accused of attempting to sidestep local communities in its bid to meet an ambitious renewable energy target by developing a fast-track process for some wind-farm developers to alter or expand already-approved sites…
The changes come within the Andrews government’s Planning and Building Legislation Amendment, an omnibus bill that also proposes to boost affordable housing and crack down on dodgy builders.
Under the plan, wind-farm developers wanting to make changes to projects that have been “called in” or approved by the minister will be able to sidestep a planning- panel process that often takes several months, and instead be judged in an expedited system by a standing committee. The new process proposes to cut time and legal costs because the Standing Assessment Committee has to consider objections without hearing them in a panel setting…READ ALL
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/farmer-may-be-gone-with-the-wind-farm-and-do-a-blade-runner/news-story/ef73a8268c01b8f27e68d4f893598e74
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25 Sept: DonegalDemocrat: Outrage at second wind farm plan
By Declan MaGee
A Donegal community has vowed to fight another large wind farm development 18 months after a similar development was knocked back.
Finn Valley Wind Action says it will “vigorously oppose” plans that could see 36 wind turbines built between Castlefin and Barnesmore Gap…
The company had plans for 49 turbines in the same area turned down by An Bord Pleanála in March of last year…
An Bord Pleanála ruled last month that the development constitutes strategic infrastructure development and any application will be decided by the board and not local planners, as allowed under the Planning and Development Act…
Marie Byrne of Finn Valley Action said the application will be vigorously opposed.
“The community are once again outraged that they are faced with a reapplication for a major wind farm in the Finn Valley,” she said…
http://www.donegaldemocrat.ie/news/home/272626/outrage-at-second-wind-farm-plant.html
seems a bit EXCESSIVE, time-wise!
25 Sept: CBC: Massive wind turbines to crowd Queensway for weeks
Wind blades expected to travel along Highway 417 until November, Transportation Ministry says
Enormous wind blades will be taking up space on the Queensway for weeks as they make their way to Quebec, the Ministry of Transportation said.
The turbines have been travelling since Aug. 22 from a manufacturing plant in Tillsonburg, Ont.
The turbines caused some commuters to grumble and snap photos as the enormous blades travelled through Ottawa last Friday.
It’s expected the blades will be assembled and done travelling by November, but that timeframe is dependent on weather and the job site, the ministry said.
The wind turbines are heading to a wind farm in Saint-Sylvester, Que.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/massive-wind-turbines-crowd-queensway-1.4303483
20
I paid college tuition as a roofing contractor in the 1970s, when the job of a roof was to keep rain out of the house. After inspecting some solar heating and photovoltaic installations it became my company policy to have nothing whatsoever to do with repairing the resulting roof leaks. After reading a bid for reroofing a section ruined by the necessary foot-traffic and penetrations, I’ll wager homeowners will take those contraptions down. Online ads selling used rooftop solar apparatus would be an interesting indicator to watch. For heating water, nothing is cheaper, more effective and less damaging than hundreds of feet of ordinary garden hose carefully laid out on the rooftop. You fill it up, then drain hot water off into an insulated drum of an afternoon all summer long.
30
another sorry tale. note ***Google has a 12.5 per cent shareholding:
24 Sept: BusinessDailyAfrica: Consumers to pay Sh5.7bn for wind power line delays
Kenya has agreed with the developers of Lake Turkana Wind Power project to charge electricity consumers Sh5.7 billion from next May as penalty for government’s failure to build a transmission line to the wind farm.
Energy principal secretary Joseph Njoroge said the deal was reached after months of negotiations with the foreign developers, their respective embassies and lenders, including the African Development Bank (AfDB).
Kenya had committed to start paying a monthly fine of Sh700 million through consumer bills should it fail to link the mega wind farm to the national grid by January this year.
The government failed to meet that obligation with the transmission line — currently 70 per cent complete, and expected to be ready next May — forming the basis for negotiations to defer fines payment for idle power…
Homes and businesses will pay the Sh5.7 billion surcharge through their power bills, equivalent to Sh0.1 per kilowatt hour (kWh) spread over a period of six years from 2018.
Energy ministry officials said the agreed surcharge with the investors stands at €638,889 (Sh78.6 million) per month, adding up to Sh5.7 billion in the six years…
Consumers will also pay another Sh4.6 billion to a special fund created at the Treasury to cushion the Lake Turkana power investors from losses, bringing the total consumer costs, outside the normal electricity bill, to Sh10.3 billion…
UK-based Aldwych is the single largest investor in the €623 million (Sh76.6 billion) wind project with a 30.7 per cent stake while ***Google has a 12.5 per cent shareholding…
Electricity from the wind park will cost Sh8.7 per unit (8.5 US cents), which is in a similar cost range as geothermal power, or three times cheaper than diesel-generated electricity.
Other investors in the consortium include KP&P Africa B.V., Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa, Industrial Fund for Developing Countries, Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries and Vestas Eastern Africa.
Kenya last month terminated the contract for the Sh20 billion transmission line, which is 70 per cent complete, with a debt-ridden Spanish contractor Isolux which bagged the tender in 2011.
http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/economy/Consumers-to-pay-Sh5-7bn-for-wind-power-line-delays/3946234-4110524-132a2sj/
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READ ALL:
25 Sept: RenewEconomy: Giles Parkinson: New rules create major road hump for wind and solar projects
The construction boom in large-scale solar farms and wind projects in Australia appears to have hit a significant road hump, with new rules imposed by the Australian Energy Market Operator causing delays, and in some cases adding costs and technology reviews, for project developers.
The issue is causing controversy because the rules changes have not yet been endorsed by the market rule-maker, but AEMO is insisting they be respected because of the sheer number and scale of the projects under construction, and because of their anticipated life-span and their role on the grid.
The changes are part of a suite of actions proposed by AEMO in response to last September’s “System Black” in South Australia. But the biggest impact for solar and wind farms appears to be around the refined definition and requirement for “continuous uninterrupted” power.
This standard – known as S5.2.5.4 – is being reinforced so as to require wind and solar farms to maintain the same level of output in the face of any big changes in frequency and voltage. No exceptions…
The easiest way to meet this requirement with solar farms is to “oversize” the number of inverters attached to the installation – giving it the extra capacity to respond to voltage to ensure it can maintain output. Or, like wind farms, it could add capacitors to the installation…READ ALL
http://reneweconomy.com.au/new-rules-create-major-road-hump-for-wind-and-solar-projects-67685/
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This is a little schizo. The left wants us all toi live in rabbit warren cities, in worker housing boxes, using mass transit to travel to and from approved destinations. I suppose the plethora of single family homes could be left to host solar and cockroaches; not much roof per capita on those bauhaus boxes. Socialism always fails because political distortion of markets pushes more costs and less outputs. And the winner is: SA? If I lived there and had a shed I’d be out tinkering for off grid survival, as I do here in FLorida for the few weeks nature may take out the power. So in the immediate present I have no problem comparing the destructive power of a hurricane to the destructive power of failed governance. AT the moment, it’s a tie, he says, from his generator powered internet.
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That is the basic premiss of Agenda 21 from the UN – the plebs are forced into cities while the privileged have everywhere else.
70
Yes. They call it “compact cities”.
20
Yes…easy to maintain and *cough* “manage” the human cattle…..keep the numbers at omptimal levels and adjust up or down through whatever means necessary.
I understand these people very well. We are cattle to them, to be managed as needed. One benefit of high population densities is most pathogens will spread faster….
40
That is why they are deliberately destroying Australian cities by allowing the demolition of traditional single family homes to be replaced by around 20 apartments. This increased density is also causing chaos on the roads making private cars increasingly unworkable forcing people into public transport making it much easier to limit their mobility.
20
Yes, you can see how society is being moulded into the greenist ideal….
Once the disruptor alt.tech for fuel turns up, it will have them freaking out – fuel indepenedence = no contol over us….
10
most of those commenting are not impressed by what MSM is calling a “study”! lol:
25 Sept: Australian: David Crowe: Electricity generators not pulling weight on greenhouse gases
The findings by the Australia Institute challenge the key government assumption that the electricity sector will have to reduce its carbon output only in line with its share of the country’s total emissions, which is 35 per cent.
Australia Institute research director Rod Campbell concluded the cost of abatement was lower in electricity compared to other industries such as manufacturing and farming, suggesting the electricity generators should do more of the work to hit the target.
“A key result is that under the more efficient abatement cost and long-term investment signal approaches, the electricity sector will need to reduce emissions by between 40 to 55 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030,” he writes in a report to be released today.
The estimate is far greater than the assumption made by Chief Scientist Alan Finkel in his report to the government in June, which has divided the Coalition on whether to endorse his suggestion of a clean energy target.
Mr Campbell said renewable power would have to account for 66 to 75 per cent of electricity generation by 2030, noting this is “substantially higher” than federal Labor’s target of 50 per cent.
The figure is also higher than the Finkel report projection that renewables would account for 42 per cent of electricity by 2030 under the clean energy target — an estimate that has sparked objections from Tony Abbott and other Coalition backbenchers.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/electricity-generators-not-pulling-weight-on-greenhouse-gases/news-story/bf7447813a29ba15b9da647d9f71bc61
30
No idea if it’s accurate but the energy widget is currently showing 1 mw for wind in Victoriastan at the moment solar about 136mw for a generating total of all forms of 5,846 , coal is holding the system together right now .
20
Of course the unemployed can shower anytime of day, or not when the sun ain’t shining and wind not blowing.
40
26 Sept: news.com.au: Australia’s expected gas shortage is three times worse than expected
THERE have been warnings about Australia running out of gas but two new reports have revealed it’s much worse than we thought.
AUSTRALIA’S gas shortage for 2018 is more than three time larger than forecast earlier in the year.
Governments are scrambling to respond to the predictions revealed on Monday from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the Australian Energy Market Operator, which are much worse than expected.
They both predict a shortfall of nearly 110 petajoules of gas in 2018 and similar in 2019.
This is about one-sixth of the projected amount of demand for gas in Australia…
http://www.news.com.au/finance/business/other-industries/australias-expected-gas-shortage-is-three-times-worse-than-expected/news-story/4399f54606ca9da71b06362505732675
26 Sept: Yahoo7: AAP: States reject call to develop gas fields
https://au.news.yahoo.com/a/37225550/states-reject-call-to-develop-gas-fields/
10
Gosh. shortage of gas = higher prices…who’d have thought…..
Its like these pipelines in places like Nigera that get “attacked” as the price of oil drops, thus forcing a shortage and prices somehow magically go up again….
Once you understand how this stuff works, nothing is a surprise.
20
25 Sept: CarbonPulse: ‘EU ETS alone can’t drive out coal’, says EC official – media
EU carbon allowance prices will never reach the point where they alone will deter coal use among utilities and industry, Recharge News reported on Monday, quoting an anonymous European Commission energy department official.
25 Sept: Bloomberg: EU Power Generators Warn Plan to Cut Use of Coal May Backfire
By Ewa Krukowska
A group representing power generators across the European Union warned that the bloc’s plans to limit the use of coal may backfire, encouraging utilities to seek returns on new fossil-fuel plants instead of putting money into clean energy.
European Commission is considering a law that would effectively block many coal-fired plants from getting support payments under the region’s capacity market, which is intended to ensure steady supplies of electricity when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining.
Utilities would probably respond by building new natural gas plants, which while cleaner than coal, still produce greenhouse gases blamed for global warming, according to Eurelectric, the lobby group representing the big power generators. That, the group said, would leave the power generators focused on getting a return from new gas plants instead of investing in zero-emissions systems that could cope with variable flows from wind and solar farms…
The EU law would block from the capacity market any electricity producers whose carbon discharges exceed 550 grams per kilowatt-hour, a level that would exclude coal from the system. The lobby group instead suggests lawmakers concentrate on fixing the EU Emissions Trading System, where the cost of pollution fell 70 percent since 2008 because of a surplus in permits used in the market…READ ON
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-25/eu-power-generators-warn-plan-to-cut-use-of-coal-may-backfire
26 Sept: Herald Sun: BHP goes coal power peak stupid
by Terry McCrann
BHP has embraced stupidity as its core corporate strategy. It thinks that by feeding “someone else” to the global warming tiger, which it has by the tail, that will avoid the tiger eating it.
Earth to the BHP boardroom, located somewhere up there in the clouds — in cloud-cuckoo land indeed — all that will achieve will be to make the tiger both hungrier and more agile. It will even more certainly turn to also consume you.
BHP has gone public in adding its corporate voice to the demonisation of coal-fired power: the only form of power generation that can deliver reliable, plentiful and cheap power to Australians. — including, I might add, to pensioners facing the prospect of shivering through next winter.
It has done so by both publicly backing a so-called “Clean Energy Target”, which would irresistibly rule out any new coal-fired stations and see the existing ones progressively closed, and forcing the sacking of (rational and sane) ..oal-generation supporter Brendan Pearson as head of the Minerals Council…READ ALL
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/terry-mccrann/bhp-goes-coal-power-peak-stupid/news-story/16f1cdfd149fad42bfa83edeea860e8a
10
I see riots in europe as people freeze…..
20
I always get a lot out of Terry McCrann’s comments.
30
Perhaps he’s a journalist?
10
German ‘Jamaica’ coalition spells trouble for coal, cars, and the euro
Telegraph.co.uk-5 hours ago
The share price of RWE fell 5.9pc. The company generates two thirds of its electricity from coal, much of it brown lignite…
25 Sept: Deutsche Welle: Dave Keating: Germany heads for green government
While in a coalition government with the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) from 1998 to 2005, the Greens steered Germany toward becoming one of Europe’s environmental leaders. But now, their time in power could be quite different…
The SPD has been the junior partner in a coalition with German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) for four years, but after a dismal election performance on Sunday they have ruled themselves out of a coalition for this term. This leaves Merkel with only one choice – to govern in a coalition with the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) and the Greens…
This three-way alliance, called a “Jamaica coalition” because the parties’ colors match that country’s flag, would be a very different beast from the “red-green” coalition the Greens were involved in before. Merkel’s CDU has embraced legislation to fight climate change, but has been more cautious than the SPD. The free-market FDP, meanwhile, has been downright hostile to many climate policies, says Niklas Höhne of the NewClimate Institute…
“They want to shape the whole environmental policy toward less regulation,” he told DW. “They want to get rid of the support for renewable energy that has been so successful in Germany over the past decades.”…
The Greens are likely to make phasing out coal power a red line in the coalition-building talks. But this will be difficult to achieve, given that coal accounts for 40 percent of Germany’s energy generation…
The other red line is likely to be automotive. Greens leader Cem Özdemir said in August that “the Greens will not enter a coalition that doesn’t initiate the end of the fossil combustion engine era and set the stage for emission-free transport.” The Greens want only emission-free vehicles on the road by 2030.
But Christian Lindner, the leader of the liberal FDP, has said combustion engine bans, as are currently being considered for diesel cars in several German cities, would be “economically damaging, ecologically questionable and practically impossible.” He is not in favor of government support for electric cars, saying he prefers a technology-neutral approach…
In such an environment, it would be a challenge for the Greens to get their priorities met…
And in addition to the conservative impulses within their own coalition, they would also have to deal with the surging right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which has now become the German parliament’s third-largest force.
For the first time, a party which denies the existence of climate change has entered the parliament. This could cause the governing parties to pull their punches when it comes to implementing ambitious climate reforms.
At the same time, the Greens are not powerless. At any moment, they could cause the government to fall by pulling their support if their demands are not being met.
http://www.dw.com/en/germany-heads-for-green-government/a-40676147
21 Sept: Bloomberg: How Merkel’s Green Energy Policy Has Fueled Demand for Coal
Germany still gets 40 percent of its electricity from coal-fired plants.
By Brian Parkin and Weixin Zha
Merkel aims to cut CO2 emissions by 40 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels, and Germany has spent some 650 billion euros ($780 billion) on subsidies for green power in recent decades. But the country will at best get to 30 percent by 2020, according to Berlin climate researcher Agora Energiewende. Emission reductions “won’t be a near miss but a booming failure,” Agora researchers write…
Consumers bristle at the cost as Germany has the European Union’s second-highest rates for electricity after Denmark. A green surcharge raises German power bills by some 25 percent, to an average of about 29 euro cents (34.6 U.S. cents) per KW-h this year—more than triple the level in the U.S…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-21/how-merkel-s-green-energy-policy-has-fueled-demand-for-coal
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OT I know but anyone noticed the lack of MSM coverage of the Kiwi election result , could this be because the darling of the media the leftoids didn’t win or is it because no clear result .
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Seems no clear result usually generated vast speculation in the yellow stream imo
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Off topic but interesting and relevant to the political manipulation of all our energy costs. Politicians interfere massively with energy and then blame the free market. Peter Van Onselen has a piece where he warns the Liberals not to put Abbott back.
That is a clear sign that the people behind silly solar, woeful wind and disastrous diesel are very worried that their man Tunrbull, the man Peta Credlin calls an environmentalst posing as a conservative might be tossed out and the PM who called Climate Change crap might get back. Sports bet have even money on a challenge to Turnbull this year, although the betting is on Dutton. However if the dreaded Abbott gets back, the RET goes, solar subsidies go, gas bans are gone and we have a PM who could reverse a now victory for Onselen’s Green and Labor friends.
Turnbull, the man who dreams of storing random wind power, a Very Fast Train and a useless second airport for Sydney might be tossed out and the enemy of all Greens put back. Abbott. That would be a horrible day for the Greens, ABC/SBS and the unions. Especially as the people of Victoria and South Australia have really had enough of the Energy Games and we now have prediction of imminent gas shortages in 100 cities and many blackouts across the East Coast when summer comes. Illweather’s windmills and solar will not save him, nor his Musk battery as South Australia shuts for business and even basic services.
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Edited sorry!: ‘Turnbull, might be tossed out and enemy of all Greens put back. Abbott. That would be a horrible day for the Greens, ABC/SBS and the unions.’
Would that not be just GRAND!
‘The people of Victoria and South Australia have really had enough of the Energy Games and we now have prediction of imminent gas shortages in 100 cities and many blackouts across the East Coast when summer comes.’
They seem not to be interested\involved in their own survival!
‘as South Australia shuts for business and even basic services.’
Perhaps an investment opportunity as an independent entity from Canberra! Bring in reliable Nuke power in huge gobs! Do you realy want Solar powered Submarines?
All the best!-will-
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About thirty years ago, I was party to building a solar heater for a backyard pool. My part of the gig was the electronics that controlled the pump. This was a bit tricky as it needed a few refinements after we nearly froze the pool. The black poly drip irrigation tubing not only collects heat during the day, but makes a fine radiator at night, if the pump does not shut down when the pool water is warmer than the collector!
That said, if you are going to build a collector of some sort, DO NOT cover it in perspex. This stuff is a very poor transmitter of ultra-violet light which contains the energy to heat the pipes / water. I discovered this whilst making printed-circuit boards, many years ago. GLASS is the go, see also greenhouses. There, the UV punches through, which is good for photosynthesis, BUT but by the wonders of physics, the resultant INFRA-RED light is essentially trapped by the glass and bounces around heating things up as it is absorbed.
IF you are worried about hail damage, look for “toughened” glass, preferably NOT “laminated” like car windscreens, because these contain a “plastic” layer between the inner and outer skins. Also a LOT of “architectural” glass is made to “resist” UV, not ideal for solar collectors. Yes, proper toughened glass may be more expensive than a recycled window-pane, but less hassle to replace, because you will not need to get up on the roof to replace the hail-shattered glass.
Better thing, and this applies to PV cell in particular, is to NOT mount them on your roof, especially on a two-storey house, unless you like working at heights as you wash and polish the panels to keep them at peak efficiency.
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Your first paragraph had me laughing aloud!
All good points too.
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Bruce
A perspex glider canopy will get you sunburnt but good if you don’t take precautions – just saying
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Good point, Ian.
Especially if you get to drive serious ones with altitude and endurance capability, like the magnificent Stratus and Cirrus machines.
Good times in a motley, “low-rent” assortment: Kookaburra, Slingsby T-53 and Blanik, (the latter now mostly grounded).
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Maybe a touch OT, though not much, if you haven’t already seen them they are worth a read. TonyfromOz on the latest WE Unthreaded, comments #3.3.1 and #42.
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Actually, Tony’s comments are always worth a read but I was particularly interested in those two.
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ABC News: electricity price has nothing to do with electricity.
sarc
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O/T
”We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy. One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy”.
Ottmar Odenhofer, high official in the UN climate change program.
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Also confirmed by UN Official Christiana Figueres in October 2015.
I recall reading that here some time ago.
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About that time Prime Minister Tony Abbott commented that he will not stand for socialism masquerading as environmentalism, and Christopher Monckton released a video warning Australians to watch PM Abbott’s back.
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This is that video. https://youtu.be/NG0WcjGHkEw
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btw this is the one and only piece I have so far found online that focuses on the failure of the Pen Hadow mission:
21 Sept: KNOM Radio Mission: Sailing To North Pole, Explorers Find More Ice Than Expected
By Gabe Colombo
A team of explorers and scientists returned to Nome last week after attempting to be the first to sail to the North Pole. The three-week expedition, called Arctic Mission, was led by British explorer Pen Hadow, who had previously trekked solo to the North Pole from Canada, across the sea ice.
Hadow says on this trip, the international crew of 10, and their trusty dog, Fukimi, hoped to make a global statement about climate change:
“Reaching the North Pole, while interesting as a technical challenge, is actually going to have far more serious consequences as a global warning, or signal, that something very substantial is happening across a substantial surface area of the planet.”
That “something” is the melting of ice in the Arctic Ocean. The team’s two yachts, Bagheera and Snow Dragon II, spent much of their time harbored in Sitka. Both vessels are sturdily built of steel and aluminum, which allows them to navigate through ice channels not much wider than their hulls.
Frances Brann, skipper of Snow Dragon, says the ice can give a false sense of protection:
“That ice is very serene, very still, like being in a harbor — when it’s not windy. If it’s very windy, it would be a place that you wouldn’t want to be, because those huge sheets of ice wouldn’t just drift slowly around: They’d be moving faster, you’d have a potential to get crushed.”
It’s ultimately that wind which made them to decide to turn back, at around 80 degrees north latitude. According to the team, that was still as far north as almost anybody has made it by water. Tim Gordon, marine biologist and head scientist on the mission, also says:
“It was actually very relieving to see some ice. We’d spent two weeks sailing north in what is meant to be an area that is frozen solid all year round, sailing through open water. And to know that there is still some of it that is frozen year-round was actually quite heartening for me.”
They also took heart at the amount they were able to accomplish: The crew gathered data on marine ecosystems that have been long out of reach under the ice. Gordon says this will help scientists begin to understand how things like plastic pollution, ocean acidification and increased noise are affecting these organisms.
There was personal growth, too, says Heather Bauscher, a wildlife biologist…READ ON
http://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2017/09/21/sailing-to-north-pole-explorers-find-more-ice-than-expected/
for The Guardian, it’s total spin, with finding some plastic seemingly the purpose of the expedition now! no mention of turning back:
24 Sept: Guardian: Jamie Doward: How did that get there? Plastic chunks on Arctic ice show how far pollution has spread
Discovery by UK scientists prompts fear that melting ice will allow more plastic to be released into the central Arctic Ocean – with huge effects on wildlife
The scientists, who were on the explorer Pen Hadow’s Arctic Mission attempt to sail to the north pole, were surprised to discover the blocks of polystyrene many hundreds of miles from land in areas that were, until recently, covered by ice all year round. They found two large pieces on the edge of ice floes between 77° and 80° north, in the middle of the international waters of the central Arctic Ocean…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/24/arctic-plastic-pollution-polystyrene-wildlife-threat
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26 Sept: news.com.au: Charis Chang: How Australia is being screwed over its gas
AUSTRALIA is “swimming in gas” but ordinary citizens get a raw deal when it comes to our resources. This is what’s going on.
But when the initial developments were approved, the Queensland Government, under the leadership of Labor’s Anna Bligh, rejected an option to require a percentage of the gas produced to go towards domestic supply.
This was despite the government being warned in 2009 that there could be problems with supplying its own citizens.
“Australia is unique in its sheer stupidity in allowing companies to exploit our resources and not insist they provide for our domestic market,” (energy analyst Bruce) Robertson told news.com.au.
“We are swimming in gas, the idea that we cannot provide for our own population is just a total failure of our energy policy.”…
At the moment Australia is the world’s second-largest LNG exporter, providing about 12 per cent of the world’s gas, and it is expected to become the world’s largest exporter by 2020…
In order to get more gas to send overseas, LNG operators have turned to conventional gas supplies, mainly from South Australia and Victoria.
This means that cheap gas extracted from the Bass Strait, which was mainly used by Victorians for their heating and cooking, is now being pumped all the way up to Queensland to be sold overseas…
http://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/australian-economy/how-australia-is-being-screwed-over-its-gas/news-story/4187e60617aec18e87d57453cfca0167
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Export Agreement for natural gas negotiated and entered into (signed) by the Gillard Labor Government.
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behind paywall:
Plentiful oil will sustain the age of hydrocarbons
Financial Times · 21 hours ago
25 Sept: Motley Fool: Travis Hoium: Why Vivint Solar Inc.’s Shares Plunged 16% Today
Tariffs on solar modules could make Vivint Solar Inc.’s future a lot dimmer than it was just a few days ago.
Shares of residential solar installer Vivint Solar Inc. (NYSE: VSLR) dropped as much as 15.6% today as investors began to realize that the company’s future could get a lot dimmer if President Trump imposes tariffs on solar module imports. At 2:40 p.m. EDT, shares were still down 12.3% and the negative sentiment around all solar stocks was driving the whole industry down…
The impact on Vivint Solar is certain to be higher costs for solar modules that are the core of its business. And costs could rise well over 10% if price floors of $0.78 per watt are implemented, as Suniva suggested. Higher costs mean Vivint Solar will either have to raise prices or absorb lower margins, neither of which is good for the business long term…
There are enough challenges facing Vivint Solar from changing net metering rules to intense competition and this is another terrible blow to the company. It’s hard to see how conditions will improve for Vivint Solar in 2018 with tariffs on the horizon and investors are seeing that risk as well. Until we know what the ruling from President Trump is, it will be tough to know the impact on Vivint Solar, but it’s safe to say the company’s prospects got a bit dimmer in the last few days…
https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/25/why-vivint-solar-incs-shares-plunged-16-today.aspx
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How do the Luddites continue to get away with the false claim that the unreliables are cheaper than coal or gas?
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been hearing some alarmist stuff on radio about dams running low, but without any specifics, even mentioning Wivenhoe, which I think has enough water for years to come.
anyway:
26 Sept: ABC: Dam levels across NSW continue to hold despite record dry winter
NSW Country Hour By Michael Condon
“It is counterintuitive, I know, but despite the long dry winter with almost four months without decent rainfall the dam storages are still very high,” said Tony Webber, a spokesman for Water NSW.
“The heavy rainfall and flooding seen last winter was all captured in the dams and farmers have not started to draw down any significant volumes yet.”
“On-farm storages are being drawn down, but the big state-run dams are still holding between 80 and 90 per cent.
“From the point where dams are full, even if we have zero inflow, we still have between two and three years of water stored in our state dams.
Of the big dams, Hume Dam near Albury — one of the biggest in the world — is at 91 per cent, Wyangala is at 85 per cent, Blowering Dam is at 79 per cent, Burrendong is at 77 per cent and irrigation dam Burrinjuck at 61 per cent…
“It is a good news story when many farmers have lost crops due to a lack of rain and heavy frosts…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017-09-26/despite-record-dry-winter-dam-levels-still-holding-up/8981184
following this:
Australian farmers face biggest carrot oversupply in 25 years
The Age-20 Sep. 2017
we now have:
26 Sept: ABC: Mangoes in abundance as Top End grower heads for best season in 30 years
ABC Rural By Lydia Burton
Leo Skliros said to date he had already sold more trays of mangoes in the first two-thirds of his harvest than the whole of last year’s season, with 117,000 trays packed and gone.
“I’d say we have got anywhere between 50,000 and 70,000 trays to go,” he said.
“This is by far our biggest year. Last year we did just under 100,000 trays and our biggest year to date has been 128,000 trays.
“We have had some trees that have had massive crops on them,” he said.
“We have got 117,000 trays off 11,000 larger trees, so that’s more than 10 trays per tree already. That is a big volume per tree. It has been a great crop.”…
Growers hope to avoid glut and maintain price
Overall the Australian market has received more than 838,000 trays of mangoes from the Darwin and Kununurra regions.
As the NT Mango Industry Association president, Mr Skliros said he was expecting the industry across the board to have a similar season.
We’re hoping there’s not going to be too much of a glut at any one time, which should help maintain price, and it’s been nice and dry as well so that has helped keep the quality up there.”…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017-09-26/nt-grower-leo-skliros-best-mango-season-30-years/8984868
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no admission whatsoever that the Brisbane temps predicted for last weekend didn’t materialise:
26 Sept: ABC: BOM warns record-breaking temperatures set for Queensland this week
By Talissa Siganto
Temperatures across the state are set to climb again this week, with parts of Queensland tipped to experience more record-breaking days.
Brisbane is expected to reach the high 20s on Tuesday and Wednesday but is due to peak at 37 degrees Celsius on Thursday — almost two degrees hotter than its highest-recorded September day.
Temperatures for the city are set to drop slightly on Friday but will remain in the low to mid 30s until early next week…
Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Rick Threlfall said the conditions were uncommon for this time of year.
He said the summer-like weather was due to the lack of rain.
“We haven’t seen any rainfall for a long period of time so all the sun’s energy goes into heating up the atmosphere rather than evaporating any moisture on the ground,” he said…
“The dry winter and early start of spring does help these temperatures to get well above average for this time of year.”
Mr Threlfall said a number of records had already broken over the weekend, including in Gatton in north-west Queensland where it reached a top of 38.7C on Sunday.
On Monday, Amberley reached 38.2C — its warmest September day in more than 70 years.
More records are expected to tumble by the end of the week.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-26/queensland-temperature-records-to-tumble-in-heatwave/8986454
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btw on ABC’s Just In page, this article is headlined:
“37C in Brisbane, 41C out west; Queensland temperature records set to tumble this week”
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MULTIPLE PICS: 25 Sept: Siberian Times: Dozens of cities, towns and villages get their first taste of snow after hot summer
In Yakutia the snow came earlier – with the first falls on 28-29 August, before the official end of summer.
But in western Siberia the first white blanket has now come to the cities of Omsk, Tomsk, Novosibirsk, Kemerovo, and Krasnoyarsk, as well as both Altai Republic and Altai region…
The cold blast is in contrast to last year when the first snow in western Siberia came only in the first week of October.
So far the coldest temperature as the new winter approaches is around minus 5C in Aldan, Neryungi, Aikhal and Verkhoyansk – all in Yakutia region, officially the Sakha Republic…
http://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/dozens-of-cities-towns-and-villages-get-their-first-taste-of-snow-after-hot-summer/
25 Sept: SiouxCityJournal: Canadian cold front bring below normal temps to Siouxland
by Earl Horlyk
“With a high of 59 degrees, it will definitely feel like fall,” said Lance Vanden Boogart, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sioux Falls…
“Tuesday’s high will be near 65 and the low will be around 43,” Vander Boogart said. “The normal high for Sioux City should be in the low 70s and the overnight temps should be in the mid 40s.”…
25 Sept: ClimateDepot: Study claiming models predicting too much warming ‘may be a ploy’ – ‘We were wrong, but only in the timing’ of disaster
(Roy) Spencer writes that the climate establishment may be trying to address the growing disparity between models and observations for some time, and suggests:
“The resulting new paper is part of a grand scheme that Population Bomb author Paul Ehrlich perfected decades ago. I believe the new narrative taking shape is this: ‘yes, we were wrong, but only in the timing of the coming global warming disaster. It is still going to happen… but now we have time to fix it, before it really, really is too late.’”…
Ken Haapala in The Week That Was (LINK):
TWTW Excerpt:
[Roy] Spencer’s comments on the new paper are particularly appropriate. He doubts that he and Christy would have been permitted to publish such a paper and states:“The realization by the authors that the climate models have produced too much warming since about 2000 has been out there for at least 5 years. It has been no secret, and Christy and I have been lambasted as “deniers” for repeatedly pointing it out.”…ETC
http://www.climatedepot.com/2017/09/25/study-claiming-models-predicting-too-much-warming-may-be-a-ploy-we-were-wrong-but-only-in-the-timing-of-disaster/
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READ ALL. Readfearn is cute – defends homogenisation by stating “an example might be a temperature station being moved to a ***cooler spot”! lol:
26 Sept: RenewEconomy: from DesmogBlog: Graham Readfearn: How Australia’s ‘fever swamp’ of climate science denial is pushing a non-scandal about temperatures
“The tentacles of the global warming hoax are everywhere,” said a foaming Sydney shock-jock Alan Jones on his high-ratings radio show.
“I don’t know why it’s not on the front page of the newspapers,” replied Jennifer Marohasy.
The subject of the pair’s wrath is the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) — the Australian government’s weather bureau.
Specifically, it’s the way the Bureau collects and records temperatures…
Last week, I interviewed former BoM director Rob Vertessy, who described the attacks from a “fever swamp” of climate science denial as being baseless, a waste of time, and dangerous, especially when they’re amplified by Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper The Australian…
So let me explain why it’s not on the front page of the newspapers, why there is no scandal, and how the bureau’s data has largely stood up to scrutiny…
Homogenize This
There are two elements of the ACORN–SAT data that Marohasy has tried to argue against. Let’s take them in turn.
Marohasy says the bureau has data going back much further than 1910 (which it does) and that this would show that Australia was warmer back then than it is now, if only the bureau would include it…
Would it really show that?
Well, the Berkeley Earth project used the same pre-1910 data that Marohasy refers to in a reconstruction of temperatures in Australia. The results could not be clearer. Marohasy is wrong. Australia is much warmer now than it was then…
Marohasy, like other global warming deniers, also attacks a method used by the BoM and other major climate and weather agencies around the world (and by the Berkeley project) that’s known as homogenization…
ACORN–SAT is a homogenized dataset. Homogenization takes account of changes in individual weather monitoring stations that can have an impact on the temperature recordings.
An example might be a temperature station being moved to a ***cooler spot, or buildings or vegetation changing around a site. If you were interested in changes relevant to the climate, then you would not want to introduce non-climatic errors into your data…READ ALL
http://reneweconomy.com.au/australias-fever-swamp-climate-science-denial-pushing-non-scandal-temperatures-32538/
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25 Sept: Scientific American: Trump Administration May Soon Ax Obama’s Big Climate Rule
Many expect EPA will reassess the Clean Power Plan to show a higher price tag and smaller benefits
By Robin Bravender & Niina Heikkinen, E&E News
When the Obama administration issued its landmark climate rule in 2015, officials declared that benefits to public health and the climate would be enormous — dwarfing the costs.
For every dollar spent to comply with U.S. EPA’s Clean Power Plan, the public could potentially get more than $6 in benefits, the Obama team said. Those benefits would come in part from averting premature deaths, asthma attacks and other health problems.
Now, the Trump administration is poised to ax the rule, a move the president touted again Friday night at a rally in Huntsville, Ala.
***Of the Clean Power Plan, Trump said, “Did you see what I did to that? Boom, gone,” according to CNN.
Observers close to the rollback expect EPA to release its proposal next week, before an Oct. 7 deadline by which the agency has to update a federal appeals court on its plans. Many are expecting the agency to solicit comment on a drastically scaled-back version of the rule. They’re also expecting EPA to release an overhauled look at the costs of the Obama-era regulation that has been recalculated to show a higher price tag and smaller benefits.
“I expect them to use fuzzy math, for sure, to lower the benefits and increase the costs,” said Alison Cassady, director of energy and environment policy at the Center for American Progress…READ ALL
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trump-administration-may-soon-ax-obamas-big-climate-rule/
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I have a PV rooftop system that offsets nearly my entire power bill, but in respect to the larger energy grid, it only makes sense in Tasmania where I live, because we have 90%+ Hydro Power.
Mass PV rooftop feedback in the Summer is probably a great fit with Hydroelectricity which is built up on winter rainfall. How on earth mass PV rooftop solar would work in States that have rubbish hydrology is beyond me … not that the Greens and looney left need to have any logic behind their dogma.
This “pumped hydro” is a complete sham. The ABC are literally selling this rubbish idea as a “power source”, even though it is only a *power storage* technique akin to a very inefficient battery. Power sources need to create new energy for a grid, not suck it up from the grid so that it can be used later on (after a considerable power loss I might add).
They’re total nuts and I’m starting to think that they mostly don’t have the brain capacity to understand how complex systems work in the real world. When I look at people like Sarah Hanson Young, I’m really starting to think this is caused mostly by an IQ deficiency on the left.
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