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Image by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay
By Jo Nova
In a nasty shock, the VNI West interconnector price has doubled and doubled again
The whole renewables fantasy is unraveling before our eyes.
In 2023 the Victorian NSW interconnector was supposed to cost $1.8 billion. By May this year the price-tag had doubled to $3.6 billion, and now a mere two months later, the estimate has been revised again up to $7.6 billion and that’s plus or minus 30 to 50%. So it could cost as much as $11 billion. (And who knows where this trend ends?)
Without this transmission line, many future wind and solar farms evaporate, not just ones that wanted to connect to it, but other ones further away. Even offshore wind farms are less profitable without the VNI and other mainland connectors. Intermittent generators make more profits when there are bigger mainland lines to spread their erratic surges of electricity through.
“The Jacobs review also notes that without VNI-West, other significant renewable energy generation and network projects like offshore wind off the coast of Victoria will be less effective.”
— Summary of the Independent Assessment of Plan B
This […]
By Jo Nova
Foiled — Coal plants are closing (in theory) in Australia, but all the cheap, free, wind and solar power needs hideously expensive high voltage towers, which aren’t going to be built in time, or maybe ever. Last week the AEMO officially announced there would be a two year delay, throwing a spanner in the transition timeline. Coal plants like Yallourn, are supposed to be closing in 2028, but the Victoria-NSW-Interconnector (VNI) won’t be ready until 2030 now.
It doesn’t matter how much wind or sun falls on outback plains if there is no cable to connect them. The renewables-unreliable industry is worthless without these large pieces of infrastructure, which the farmers detest, and the industry can’t possibly afford to pay for itself.
The organization of the farmers in Victoria is just inspirational — all the paddocks marked in red are the areas farmers have refused access to the VNI project. Give these people a medal.
The Australian
‘We’ll fight them at the gate’: Vic farmers vow to step up fight against VNI West transmission project.
By Christine Middap, The Australian
And now, as the Victorian government presses ahead with legislation […]
By Jo Nova The Transmission line cost bomb just went off and it changes everything
This is big. So big the AEMO just announced transmission line costs are up as much as 55%, and they are going to re-visit projects they previously said needed to proceed (which is the nice way of saying they will have to axe some or many of them). What no one is spelling out, is that if the transmission lines can’t be built, they also can’t build the vast solar and wind “farms” that the Labor government was depending on. Suddenly a lot of renewable projects are orphans.
Australia is supposed to build 10,000 kilometers of high voltage transmission lines by 2050. But last week, the AEMO admitted in their Draft 2025 Electricity Network Options Report that these interconnectors would cost between 25 to 55% more than expected, which makes them essentially unaffordable.
Plan B is where they pretend cars, home solar and batteries can save the “Transition”
The old plan of massive wind and solar factories spread across the continent is quietly mutating into a DIY version where the government hopes homeowners will rescue the Net Zero transition by buying the batteries the […]
By Jo Nova
Did they forget to mention a clean green planet is full of steel transmission lines?
Recently the International Energy Agency (IEA) told the world off for not preparing the Earth for the transition they want to force upon us. Apparently, we should have paid attention and built the right grid and now, due to our laziness, we will have to rush in another 80 million kilometers of interconnectors by 2040. Just like that.
All the high voltage lines we built in the last century, we have to build again in the next 17 years.
Remember, it’s not their fault that renewables need far more land, more space, more back up and more infrastructure — it’s our fault we didn’t build a world ready for their holy energy. Those sacred wind and solar gifts cannot be bestowed upon us! We are unworthy:
IEA Lack of ambition and attention risks making electricity grids the weak link in clean energy transitions First-of-its-kind global study finds the world must add or replace 80 million km of grids by 2040, equal to all grids globally today, to meet national climate targets and support energy security.
Notice how these changes “are essential” […]
By Jo Nova
A second big Australian “Pumped Hydro” scheme is crashing on economic rocks…
The Marinus Link cable was meant to spark a glorious renewables boom and make Tasmania “The Battery of the Nation”, instead it will cost more than a new advanced coal fired plant, provide no energy at all, and currently even the thought of it is causing chaos. New projects are on hold, factories can’t expand and Tasmania is held hostage to visions of an electricity grid designed to stop storms instead of generate energy.
The Marinus Link is a 255km cable that was supposed to be the second interconnector from Tasmania to the mainland. In theory it would cost $3 billion and carry 1.5GW of electricity. But the costs have blown out to $5.5 billion and the State Premier is balking at the new bill.
However, most of the new wind power projects in the state are awaiting the magic cable before they commit — without it, they can’t reach the real market, which is mainland Australia. But without them, the local grid doesn’t have enough surplus capacity to cover the lean times (or rather, without the cable, they can’t get access to more reliable […]
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JoNova A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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