Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t JoNova – “The Australian” newspaper reports that a rise in costs, climate “fatigue”, and a rise in green tokenism has caused a collapse in demand for an Aussie green energy scheme.
Climate change fatigue, cost hits renewable GreenPower scheme
GreenPower, a scheme run by state governments in which people and businesses pay more for their power to buy non-fossil-fuel electricity, has been hit by up to a 40 per cent increase in cost as retailers pass on the rising price of large-scale renewable energy certificates.
…
Even before the price jump, the willingness of customers to pay more for renewable energy has ebbed in line with the political debate over climate change policies.
The scheme has gone from more than 900,000 customers in 2008 who bought about 1 per cent of total generation to just over 500,000 who bought just 0.6 per cent of all the electricity generated in 2013.
Since, sales have dropped a further 21 per cent.
…
A report by UTS’s Institute of Sustainable Futures for the NSW Department of Resources and Energy — which administers the scheme on behalf of all the states — said the rise in roof- top solar panels had contributed to the demise of GreenPower. “It seems that once customers have ‘done their bit’ by paying for solar PV, they no longer see the need to pay extra for GreenPower.”
Read more (paywalled): http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/climate-change-fatigue-cost-hits-renewable-greenpower-scheme/news-story/f539152e18a55644110c07a508415a7a
So why is the price of green power rising?
According to the Sydney Morning Herald;
“Retailers are making it more expensive than it needs to be for the consumer,” said Richie Farrell, group manager of investor relations and strategy at Infigen Energy.
“The consumer is entering into a contract with them to buy renewable energy and they are not taking action to enter into a contract with renewable energy providers to supply the electricity, they are just entering into short-term agreements on the spot market to meet the liability the customer has imposed on them through purchasing their product.”
Mr Farrell said it all comes down to supply and demand.
“For a long time the renewable energy certificate market was oversupplied. Everyone knew there was going to be an upcoming shortfall and to avoid that shortfall retailers were required to enter into long-term contracts with people like ourselves to ensure that more renewable supply came into the market.”
Unfortunately for consumers, he said, retailers have so far refused to do that.
“They have sat on their hands and not entered into these new contracts. Basically, by our projections, by 2017-18 we will have more demand than supply for renewable energy, and as such prices increase in that scenario.”
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/why-are-green-energy-prices-going-through-the-roof-20160105-glzgva.html
You can hardly blame energy retailers for being hesitant to commit to long term contracts. There simply isn’t an upside, to taking financial risks, to try to revive the already aneamic green energy market.
Australia is facing difficult economic conditions, and the Australian government is carrying a substantial and growing debt.
If the global economic slowdown worsens, Aussie government debt could very rapidly balloon to dangerous levels. In other countries, a public debt crisis was the trigger for retroactive, uncompensated cuts to green subsidies.
When individuals, businesses and governments tighten their belts, unnecessary luxuries like expensive green energy are often top of the list of costs to be cut.
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South Oz. First they sold our public utilities (the ones we, the public, owned) to bail out state debt from mismanagement. Then those private power generation companies, in agreement with the state government progressively lifted power rates – apparently this is competition which drives prices down. Ha! Now we have more “renewable” “green” energy being pushed on us with further rate increases to happen. This on top of record unemployment (8.2%) plus underemployment leading to a 20% rate. It doesn’t matter what side of politics they hail from – we’re screwed either way.
Patrick … SA is the cradle of wind power in OZ, it is bloody expensive … the debt came from years of socialist policies that encouraged the wind power providers with huge subsidies, that is why your power is the most expensive in Oz. The expensive power has driven most manufacturing businesses and others out of the State, that is why SA has the highest levels of unemployment in OZ with no upside to it. It does matter what side of politics is in … but the medicine for SA is more than what they can now afford … yes you are screwed but blame it on the sub-intelligence of the people that voted in socialists, they’ve now run out of other people’s money.
Lets hope that these scoundrels, who have participated in brain washing the public entirely in order to line their own pockets, will meet their just deserts.
Perhaps they are finding that once the public start getting hit in their pockets, their eyes are opened so that green isn’t so attractive any more. Rip the public off even more and these scoundrels may find that the whole green thing wasn’t such a good idea.
But still watch Agenda 21. See my blog.
Roger
http://www.thedemiseofchristchurch.com
But surely, saving the planet is a good thing. Leonardo just sent a message from his super yacht in St. Barts. Madonna says so from her Learjet, hired to take her 120 miles. John Travolta says so from one of his 7 private airliners, Bonio says so from his accountants where he is signing off the next tax avoidance scheme for the super rich. Suzuki, Grantham, Al Gore, they all say so as they accumulate more money each minute than most of us earn by hard graft in a lifetime. Vivienne Westwood says so as she farms out her products to child labour in the far East, Cameron says so as his father in law collects a thousand a week from wind subsidies. What is wrong with you people? How can you argue against such admired and influential people?
Well said!
Ivor,
Treble ++!
Milli-query: wasn’t Bonio some sort of dog’s breakfast?
Auto, admiring a veritable declension of hypocrisy!
The biggest mistake in my life was coming back to Australia. I had 11 years of a wonderful life in China. Broadband, low electricity costs, no tax, no Turnbull. I’m outa here in 6 weeks time and heading back to China. I will take a hit to the hip pocket but I don’t care. Its all about lifestyle. I’ll make my money back in a short time. See ya Australia. Go F@ck yourself
You have a point….
“You call that government debt” (Australia = $725B) … “Now this is government debt” (Canada = $1200B)
The thing to remember about the renewable industry , is that its a industry what they sell makes difference to the fact that their major concern is making money.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/12/26/the-value-of-petroleum-fuels/comment-page-1/#comment-2107795
[excerpt]
I have worked in the energy industry for much of my career.
When challenged on this question by green fanatics, I explain that that fossil fuels keep their families from freezing and starving to death.
Cheap abundant reliable energy is the lifeblood of society – it IS that simple.
A few facts:
Wind Power is what warmists typically embrace – trillions of dollars have been squandered on worthless grid-connected wind power schemes that require life-of-project subsidies and drive up energy costs.
Some background on grid-connected wind power schemes:
The Capacity Factor of wind power is typically a bit over 20%, but that is NOT the relevant factor.
The real truth is told by the Substitution Capacity, which is dropping to as low as 4% in Germany – that is the amount of conventional generation that can be permanently retired when wind power is installed into the grid.
The E.ON Netz Wind Report 2005 is an informative document:
http://www.wind-watch.org/documents/wp-content/uploads/eonwindreport2005.pdf
(apparently no longer available from E.ON Netz website).
Figure 6 says Wind Power is too intermittent (and needs almost 100% spinning backup);
and
Figure 7 says it just gets worse and worse the more Wind Power you add to the grid (see Substitution Capacity dropping from 8% to 4%).
Same story applies to grid-connected Solar Power (both in the absence of a “Super-Battery”).
This was all obvious to us decades ago – we published similar conclusions in 2002.
Trillions of dollars have been wasted globally on green energy that is not green and produces little useful energy.
**********
Today’s comment:
The following numbers are from the 2015 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, for the year 2014:
http://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/pdf/energy-economics/statistical-review-2015/bp-statistical-review-of-world-energy-2015-primary-energy-section.pdf
Global Primary Energy Consumption by Fuel is 86% Fossil Fuel (Oil, Coal and Natural Gas),
4% Nuclear,
7% Hydro,
and 2% Renewables.
That 2% for Renewables is vastly exaggerated, and would be less than 1% if intermittent wind and solar power were not forced into the grid ahead of cheaper and more reliable conventional power.
This is not news – we have known this energy reality for decades. As we published in 2002.
“The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
We also write in the same article, prior to recognition that the current ~20 year “Pause” was already underway:
“Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
I (we) now think global cooling will commence after the current El Nino runs its course, prior to 2020 and possibly as soon as 2H2017. Bundle up!
Regards to all, Allan
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/10/11/study-high-co2-levels-equated-to-warm-average-temperatures-and-flourishing-life-low-co2-preceding-an-ice-age-and-eventual-mass-extinction/#comment-2047541
[excerpt]
A few more thoughts below: Climate heresy now, but conventional wisdom in 10-20 years.
Regards, Allan 🙂
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/06/13/presentation-of-evidence-suggesting-temperature-drives-atmospheric-co2-more-than-co2-drives-temperature/
Observations and Conclusions:
1. Temperature, among other factors, drives atmospheric CO2 much more than CO2 drives temperature. The rate of change dCO2/dt is closely correlated with temperature and thus atmospheric CO2 LAGS temperature by ~9 months in the modern data record
2. CO2 also lags temperature by ~~800 years in the ice core record, on a longer time scale.
3. Atmospheric CO2 lags temperature at all measured time scales.
4. CO2 is the feedstock for carbon-based life on Earth, and Earth’s atmosphere and oceans are clearly CO2-deficient. CO2 abatement and sequestration schemes are nonsense.
5. Based on the evidence, Earth’s climate is insensitive to increased atmospheric CO2 – there is no global warming crisis.
6. Recent global warming was natural and irregularly cyclical – the next climate phase following the ~20 year pause will probably be global cooling, starting by ~2020 or sooner.
7. Adaptation is clearly the best approach to deal with the moderate global warming and cooling experienced in recent centuries.
8. Cool and cold weather kills many more people than warm or hot weather, even in warm climates. There are about 100,000 Excess Winter Deaths every year in the USA and about 10,000 in Canada.
9. Green energy schemes have needlessly driven up energy costs, reduced electrical grid reliability and contributed to increased winter mortality, which especially targets the elderly and the poor.
10. Cheap, abundant, reliable energy is the lifeblood of modern society. When politicians fool with energy systems, real people suffer and die. That is the tragic legacy of false global warming alarmism.
Allan MacRae, Calgary, June 12, 2015
Allan,
Many thanks.
Can I clarify, for passing liberals [Here, rarer than rocking horse 5h!t, but never mind]:
You write: –
“I (we) now think global cooling will commence after the current El Nino runs its course, prior to 2020 and possibly as soon as 2H2017. Bundle up!”
Clarification – this could be the latter part of next year.
Auto, appreciating your Observations and Conclusions.
I suspect that Allen’s experience in the energy industry includes zero experience in the power industry. It is not practical to store electricity so location is very important. So if Calgary has good wind resources, it might make sense to replace fossil generation and sell oil and natural gas to the US.
Is the Tesla Powerwall a failure ?
Knute commented: …”Is the Tesla Powerwall a failure ?…”
Yes from a practical perspective since very few can afford the PV panels + the battery(ies). But it’s much like the Tesla car……a status symbol with limited usefulness available only to the wealthy who can afford it. Although the car does have many redeeming features beyond being gas free that are not available in IC cars. And no from a business perspective because both are products born out of subsidies, not competition or need so technically they can’t fail.
Thanks Mark
So technically they work to store energy, right ?
It’s just a matter of who pays for them.
Retired Kit P – your comments are nonsense.
Suggest you read the E,On Netz Wind Report 2005 – see Fig. 6 & 7.
http://www.wind-watch.org/documents/wp-content/uploads/eonwindreport2005.pdf
This is really, really easy instead of schemes to make “green” energy expensive why not schemes to make it cheap?
Making green energy cheap is easier said than done.
It is much easier to lie about it – to say green energy is “free”, that it will create many jobs, and that it will improve the environment. None of these lies have any validity for current green energy schemes.
I think there is some potential for some forms of green energy, but current grid-connected wind and solar power schemes are uneconomic and counterproductive.
EU energy, July 10, 2015
‘The Yieldco: the solar revolution meets Wall Street’
There is big money to be made in the Yieldco market in solar and wind projects.
http://www.energypost.eu/yieldco-solar-revolution-meets-wall-street
Hi Barbara,
You probably know this, since it is a typical situation:
In my province of Alberta, intermittent grid–connected wind power is paid 20 cents per KWh, even when there is no demand for that wind power whereas reliable fossil-fueled power is paid about 5 cents per KWh.
Almost 100% fossil-fueled backup of wind power is required because the wind does not blow all the time.
In fact, when there is no demand the wind power is worth nothing, unless it can bee sold (usually at a great loss) to other venues where there is demand.
What’s the solution?
Then: Don’t build the wind power in the first place.
Now: Drop the subsidies and let the wind power companies sort it out for themselves.
Regards, Allan
Australians could have low electricity prices from competitive bid, utility scale solar but they were slow to pick up on the concept and the tech/cost advantages. Instead they went with rooftop and idiotic solar CSP demonstration projects. Oh well, it seems to be a common green populist mistake translated onto uncompetitive energy policy choices. They could have built 100 nuclear scale solar projects by now with declining costs all along the way.
You mean like the NBN?
Bad news, just planned to charge my 90Kw/h Tesla Battery at home. I am disappointed.
Australia utilities offer two power options. fissile fuel electricity (mostly coal) or renewable electricity. Regardless of which option is chosen Australians are paying the some of the highest electricity rate in the world.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-21/australians-pay-highest-power-prices-says-study/3904024
Electricity rates were high even before the carbon tax was implemented and then later canceled. Why are rates so high? Simple, utilities projected electricity demand was about to surge causing power shortages. The government then allowed utilities to raise there rates to pay for the grid updates. Unfortunately it appears that not all that money is being used to upgrade the grid.
http://www.smh.com.au/business/sunday-explainer-why-is-electricity-so-expensive-20150925-gjvdrj.html
The end result of these high cost is that Australians are not buying the utility’s green power or increasingly even the the dirty coal power. Instead they are spending money on the lowest cost energy they can get. That is rooftop solar PV. in 2008 there was basically no rooftop PV in Australia. Today there is over 4000MW of PV on homes. and the total installed PV capacity is growing rapidly as more homes and businesses add more and more solar . The end result of all this is that for the first time in Australian history electricity demand is dropping with no end in site.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Australia
Perhaps Mr Farrall of Infigen ( Infigen, the spinoff from the infamously bankrupt Babcock and Brown) could also enlighten readers about his part in making a claim concerning a highly reputable acoustic engineer’s report about turbine noise from Infigen’s wind farm near Canberra.