Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t JoNova – The closure of South Australia’s GM Holden Car Factory (13,000 jobs) will help stabilise South Australia’s green electricity grid, according to the government AEMO.
Holden closure will help Energy Market Operator manage SA’s blackout risk, report finds
By political reporter Nick Harmsen
Part of the soon-to-be vacated Holden factory in Adelaide is about to be transformed into a temporary power station to help stave off load-shedding blackouts this summer.
But the car industry’s closure will help the authorities manage the risk of blackouts in another way.
The exit of a once powerful manufacturing sectorwill see the state using less electricity, particularly during the all-important summer peak.
The information is contained in the latest Electricity Forecasting Insights published by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO).
“Projections for strong growth in rooftop PV and other consumer changes, along with closure of the automotive industry, are forecast to result in lower consumption in the next two years,” the report said.
…
Read more: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-02/how-holden-closure-will-help-ease-energy-demand/8765828
The AEMO web page which contains the quote about closing the automotive industry is available here. Also archived here, in case the AEMO decides to edit the entry about South Australia.
I guess this is one sure way to stabilise a green electricity grid. The more factories you shut down, particularly energy intensive heavy industry, and the more workers you fire, the more you stabilise the grid.
The typical solution for “green” energy to meet customer needs, get rid of the customers.
When that plants closes, there will be way more than 13,000 lost jobs. Many of the jobs that are needed to support the plant and it’s employees will also go. Could easily lose more than 50,000 jobs in total.
This is progress towards a lower standard of living.
Which is the point, drive people into poverty and then they depend on government to survive. At that point they are no longer citizens, the essence of the environmentalist dream, total control.
As an old ozzie one has to tell the world that we are at the moment encumbered in our federal state and local councils with a pack of idiots. They are all trying to outdo one another with their green credentials, thus we are suffering the pangs of stupidity on a monumental scale. The only things that keep me sane are my V8 Utility, my huge bonfires and rides on my very loud Harley. This is my one finger salute to stupidity.
I wonder where those 13,000 ex-car workers will buy their cars from and whether the Australian government has high import taxes on foreign-made autos.
“The exit of a once powerful manufacturing sector will see the state using less electricity, particularly during the all-important summer peak.”
Well, now we know how it’s done!
How will New York smell once horse drawn wagons become the default mode of transportation?
Here we have one of the characteristics of a renewable powered grid – it requires a generous overcapacity of generation sources, even during typical conditions. One can achieve that either by reducing demand or by adding more generation capacity. The better solution is to add reliable capacity. Regardless, you will always need overcapacity – the greater the percentage of renewables
the greater the overcapacity required. Overcapacity increases costs. While renewables being accepted onto the grid in preference to non-renewables results (usually, not always – nuclear)
in reduced fuel costs. But fuel costs are often not even the dominant expense of a power plant,
so accepting renewablepower in preference to non-renewable, plant produced power, causes
the per unit costs of the power produced by the plant to increase, since its capacity is reduced.
A plant produces its cheapest power, obviously, when it is operating at full capacity. In the case of nuclear this is very pronounced, since fuel for a nuclear plants costs very little (less than a penny per kWhr) and, in any event, a nuclear plant cannot ramp up and down fast enough to actually save any fuel. So redcuing the capacity of nuclear plant by 50% , increses its per unit costs by almost double. THAT is why some of our nuclear plants have been losing money (those located in regions where a lot of renewable power is avaialble to the grid) which began when utilities were required to accept renewable power in preference to every other type of generation. A really stupid move whose side effects the braindead politicans didn’t even realize. So now the same politicians have to subsidize the nuclear plants, else lose their reliable power source and place the grid in jeopardy.
Stupidiy at every step in the process. At the top of the list is the idiocy that while the object is to use low carbon power, they excluded the lowest carbon producer of them all – nuclear. That compliments of the 40 year campaign by the left wing against nuclear power. Like I said, stupidity
all around.
“Plant Closures Helping to Stabilise South Australia’s Green Electricity Grid”
Wonderful. We’re seeing the beginnings of the de-industrialization the leftists have always dreamed of.
“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse. Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” -ex UNEP Director Maurice Strong
“We have wished, we ecofreaks, for a disaster… to bomb us into the stone age, where we might live like Indians.” -Stewart Brand, Whole Earth Catalogue
“A massive campaign must be launched to de-develop the United States.” -John Holdren, Obama’s current Science Czar, 1973
We are getting lucky. Maurice Strong is no longer. The Whole Earth Catalogue is no longer. John Holdren is no longer a Science Czar, and Obama is no longer current.
Curious George
Obama’s now a raisin. 🙂
That’s no way to Make Australia Great Again!
You’re right , we’re done for ,run save yourselves .
Opening soon in Australia: Mad Max Motor Company
No lithium ion, nitromethane only
http://mercedesblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/mad-max-mercedesblog.com-14-1140×677.jpg
“The exit of a once powerful manufacturing sector will see the state using less electricity…”
If they are this giddy about losing manufacturing jobs, how overjoyed would they be if a disaster took out half the state’s population? That would not only result in the use of much less electricity but would also greatly cut human emissions of CO2.
Those that survived would twirl&spin to create justifications for all the other’s deaths, at the same time beseeching the world to come save them. Hypocrites, one and all.