Essay by Eric Worrall
According to Professor Liam Wagner, if the Aussie government had encouraged more renewables 15 years ago, we wouldn’t be in this situation.
Rolling blackouts and higher bills: The energy market is going to give Australians a Christmas present no one wants
By Daniel Jeffrey – 2 days ago
Picture this: it’s the peak of summer. Temperatures across Australia have finally warmed up, and people around the country are reaching for their fans and air conditioners – only to be stymied by the threat of rolling blackouts.
It might seem unlikely, but according to one energy and environmental economics expert, it’s a genuine threat.
“I think we’re more than likely going to have a repeat of June,” Liam Wagner, associate professor at the Centre for Food and Resources at Adelaide Univesity, told 9news.com.au.
…
“A majority of (coal-fired generators) are far too old to be operating,” he said.
“But they are continuing to operate because we haven’t had an energy policy in Australia that’s conducive to replacing their capacity with something else.
…
“You would see a significant drop in price on the wholesale market (by) injecting more renewables into the grid,” he said.
“It’s not happening quickly enough. It should have happened 15 years ago. I’ve been shouting at the top of my lungs, I’ve been blue in the face for the last 15 years.”
…
Read more: https://amp.9news.com.au/article/5cfb151e-2b4c-4e50-b324-bb585d37ad92
Professor Liam Wagner believes renewables are cheaper than coal.
If renewables are so cheap, why is government policy even needed to encourage investment in renewables? Why don’t people flock to building renewables of their own free will, to replace Australia’s ailing coal plants, and address the shortfall of electricity which I agree is likely during this Southern Hemisphere Summer?
Genuine money driven energy revolutions don’t require significant government policy support – the new energy source rapidly displaces the old energy source, as investors flock to the new opportunity to make money.
… When a clean-burning kerosene lamp invented by Michael Dietz appeared on the market in 1857, its effect on the whaling industry was immediate. Kerosene, known in those days at “Coal Oil”, was easy to produce, cheap, smelled better than animal-based fuels when burned, and did not spoil on the shelf as whale oil did. The public abandoned whale oil lamps almost overnight. By 1860, at least 30 kerosene plants were in production in the United States, and whale oil was ultimately driven off the market. When sperm oil dropped to 40 cents a gallon in 1895, due to lack of demand, refined petroleum, which was very much in demand, sold for less than 7 cents a gallon. …
Read more: San Joaquin Valley Geology
This rapid replacement of traditional energy sources is simply not happening with the green revolution, because green energy is too expensive. Regulatory hostility is destroying the old energy, coal and gas – but new energy production is not being built at sufficient scale to replace the destroyed fossil fuel plants.
The other option to resolve blackouts would be to relax political pressure on coal plant operators, to restore enough market confidence to repair existing plants, and build new coal plants. Plenty of coal plant construction is happening around the world, because burning coal is cheap, even when it has to be imported from Australia. Global coal consumption hit a historic record of eight billion tons this year. But regulatory hostility in Australia is preventing this obvious resolution to our energy shortages.
Fixing this deadlock will require Aussie voters to wake up and elect different politicians. So long as Australian people keep electing politicians who support Net Zero, so long as the Australian people continue to swallow the mistruth that renewables are cheap, and will eventually bring down prices, the risk of blackouts and skyrocketing energy prices will continue.
We just had a cold spell in Texas. Wind dropped to less than ten percent of typical deliveries.
Tom, I was watching the grid thru the blast. Wind was up to 24 GW at the peak, then the front passed thru and it dropped 20 and then to 16 and eventually to about 5. Natural gas and coal picked up the slack. I was interesting following how it worked so well. Apparently, there were some oil fired plants brought on as well. Last time the bureaucrats prevented the spare reserve and would not permit ramping up of the gas, oil and coal plants. Now that all those board members are gone, we cruised through. The peak was around 75 GW.
Wind is like a drunkard.
He drinks too much and dozes off, then he partially sobers up, tries his best, but not enough oomph.
So it goes, day and day out, for 20 years or so.
However, the wind generous subsidies are the most reliable for the Owners, while all others get screwed with poor electricity service
Interesting. The UK peak electricity demand( for the highest month Feb) is around 53GW, for around 2x the population of Texas.
When the price is too high, “demand” isn’t a reasonable metric.
In reality it is somewhat higher, since you are looking at generation connected to the high voltage transmission grid, not including low voltage embedded generation. Moreover, you must remember that most UK households have natural gas furnaces and central heating systems, so they aren’t relying on electricity for heat. In our cold snap gas demand spiked to over 4TWh/day (about 1TWh of which was being used for power generation).
re: “Last time the bureaucrats prevented the spare reserve and would not permit ramping up of the gas, oil and coal plants.”
Cite please?
(IIRC, a number of plants failed because of the cold. Its in the reports from 1989 and 2011 too, besides the 2021 event … you’re aware of the prior events? And those reports too?)
Indeed. You can watch the wind
https://www.ventusky.com/?p=31.4;-99.4;5&l=wind-10m&t=20221222/0000
and the temperature bomb
https://www.ventusky.com/?p=31.4;-99.4;5&l=temperature-2m&t=20221222/0000
Press the play button bottom left on a laptop screen. Here’s the end result for ERCOT:
Compare with Feb 21: the wind did contribute something toward the peak this time, and enough lessons were learned to prevent the cascading trip that caused the cliff edge loss of generation and loss of gas compressors supplying CCGT in 2021.
re: “and enough lessons were learned to prevent the cascading trip”
NOTE: It didn’t get as COLD this time either. Yes/No/No opinion? I’m here in the DFW area – so I’ve lived through these events …
Soo, since wind only delivers about 30% nameplate capacity, does a 90% loss mean wind is supplying 3% of nameplate?
Exactly correct.
Right.
Any generator only produces a p[portion of its nameplate capacity, be it a coal powered which might have a single generator going off peak. They are of course switchable so that during peak it could be all units running ‘ to match the demand’ and they would laugh if it could only provide 30% when most needed
Nuclear produces over 92% of nameplate
Geothermal produces about 71% of nameplate
Gas produces over 62% of nameplate
CCGas produces 54% of nameplate
Coal produces just under 50%
Wind produces 30% of nameplate
Solar PV averages 24% of nameplate
…Solar PV could be significantly lower with increased latitude and seasonally
Solar Thermal produces about 20% of nameplate
…and in most cases requires gas back-up to keep the salt molten at night
This is always the leftists’ response when they fail.
But, but…Its always the previous government’s fault. Their policies can never be as good as ours. We are the woke champions of socialism.
The new labour government has only been in power in Australia for 6 months .
The previous conservatives had an 7 yr run
It was a 10 yr run. Thats why you can say its the previous government
”Thats why you can say its the previous government”
……’s fault for drinking the Kool aid of climate change bullshit.
Remind me who was in power 15 years ago? Oh that’s right, Labor. So now its the previous governments fault for something that is claimed should have happened before their term of government. Lol.
The previous socialists were not as competent as the current socialists.
Labor’s already done more damage in 6 months than the previous government in 7 years. And the previous government was conservative in name only.
We need to borrow more money
“We haven’t had an energy policy in Australia that’s conducive to replacing their [coal] capacity with something else.”
I don’t care about replacing capacity. Can they replace coal POWER?
Believe it or not, there seems to be some people in the bureaucracy that still believe when a 1GW coal burner is shut down, all you need to do is replace it with 1GW (nameplate) of renewables…and life as we know it goes on…..
In the ACT, they think it can be replaced with 300 MW of nameplate renewables.
Yes there’s the rub. Once again we’re playing their stupid game.
You CANNOT replace coal fired generation with “we’ll get some electricity when the wind is blowing in the requisite speed range or the Sun is shining.”
All that wind and solar REQUIRES 100% BACKUP.
> “Fixing this deadlock will require Aussie voters to wake up and elect different politicians.”
This presumes that different politicians will be offered as choices. At best the choices will be among varying shades of deep green.
One Nation for example have consistently demanded energy sanity. The options are out there, people just have to choose them.
… or a deep shade of Communist Red.
Watermelons, deep green surrounding a deep red inside, right down to it’s corrupt heart.
An Associate Professor of Energy and Environmental Economics; I imagine it would be easier to squeeze blood out of a turnip, than to get a statement out Liam Wagner that is not mostly religious in nature regarding Climastrology! If he actually believes what he is spewing, then he is neither an economist nor a scientist; he is merely a cleric preaching his faith!
Salute!
Lotta difference betweeen a “scientist” and an “engineer” until you find a smart engineer.
Groves was a smart engineer who guided the folks developing the atomic bomb. He also knew about logistics. First week or so getting his feet wet he was able to understand the physics better than many, and talk with the scientists.
So when the proud scientists out in California bragged about getting some weapon grade U-235 using cyclotrons, he asked what did you get and how long. Well, they beamed with pride and told him “x” micro grams in a week and he moved on. The program would require pounds of the stuff, and needed “mass production” unheard of in the scientific world.
Although Oak Ridge would eventually involve many centrifruges and miles of very good stainless pipes, they and the gaseous diffusion produced enough “weapon grade” stuff and then the new reactors out west became “breeders” and then the scientists and engineers looked toward U-239 and implosion and…..
The latest hydrogen announcement a few weeks ago resembles the early Manhattan days. Unlike development of transistors and solid state electronic components the physics of fusion are understood, but practical use of the reaction is gonna involve much engineering…. more than physics.
Gums sends…
The Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) was produced with cyclotron magnets used to make a large scale mass spectrometer cal a Calutron. The scientist in charge was Earnest Lawrence, who Groves held in high regard.
Pu-239 was another Berkeley discovery, though it was Fermi’s development of a reactor that could operate on natural uranium that made large scale production of weapons grade fissile material practical. The HEU for Little Boy was made with a combination of thermal enrichment, gaseous diffusion and Calutrons.
Climateproctology?
Climatephrenology.
As soon as the word “environmental” appears anywhere in someone’s “title,” you can pretty much ignore all the other facets and simply assume you’re dealing with another Eco-Nazi zealot.
..and if they had DELAYED the onslaught of heavily subsidized renewables by 15 years, the grid would not have these problems either.
Indeed, it would be all set with secure, cheap supply and new power stations.
If they NEVER IMPLEMENTED any worse-than-useless “renewable” mandates, subsidies or tax credits, none would ever have been built and we wouldn’t be “in this mess.”
And the “climate” WOULDN’T KNOW THE DIFFERENCE.
“Liam Wagner, associate professor at the Centre for Food and Resources at Adelaide Univesity,”
Another basket-weaving 101 faculty. No math, no econ, just marxy-sparxy bumf about limits to growth eugenics. As we speak, empty heads of state, NGOs and the WEF are working to make Erlich’s 1960s dystopian dud come to pass.
Thanks, Eric, and here’s my solution for those Ozzies that want to maintain control over their lives: buy a gasoline powered generator, Honda has some great models, several safe full gasoline containers, and use as needed when the CAGW Loonies play the rolling blackout game. I have mine and am not alarmed by the craziness around me. Just saying.
The Government of California has outlawed the sale of “small” gasoline or diesel engines. This means no backup generators for home use.
Don’t let your Government know about this, or they will do the same thing.
California puts out secret information reports to give extremists in leftist states a heads-up, regarding California plans for heat pumps, EVs, centralized command/ control of major appliances, etc.
That way, all looks like a groundswell towards nirvana, at no cost to implement it, because the feds will just print the money
In 2035.
Its a general small spark ignition engine ban, mostly lawn and garden but covers all generators below 25hp
But why at all?
They don’t want to force people into EVs just to have them recharged by Honda pull starts
I see lots of gas fired equipment being kept in operation well beyond its usual life span in CA.
Just my prediction about the outcome of their latest extreme stupid.
No more backup generators that use gasoline. Propane and kerosene are, as yet, legal, and possibly diesel, if I understand correctly.
Since when did a government have power to dictate which appliance you use?
Since when did citizens give up so meekly, by not rebelling against it?
Get some grit, you guys.
Geoff S
Fortunately, Califoniastan is a very narrow state & it doesn’t take long to drive to a civilized place where you can buy what you need.
Doesn’t help if they outlaw gas purchases.
And for a lot less cost so could have combined cycle natural gas generation plants.
Renewables are THE CAUSE OF higher bills.
Without worse-than-useless wind and solar being crammed down the throats of utilities, and without the related Eco-Nazi attempts to strangle oil and gas exploration, transport and refining, there would be no shortages and no high prices.
Winds that must blow within range. Sunshine that must fall within degrees. A host of handmade tales to smooth the chaotic and diverse input with fiscal incentives. A loss of synchrony with an intermittent/unreliable/renewable Green blight on the environment.
Sun isn’t worth much, at best it only produces from 10 – 2 then NADA, ZILCH, ZIP, ZERO, DIDDLY-SQUAT, BUPKIS, NAUGHT, GOOSE-EGG, for the other 20 hours a day
It was 36C here in Western Victoria where I currently am. As well a being a little warm, it’s been extremely calm. The vast fields of wind turbine producing little to no power for the last few days.
They call this “sustainable development” but if it’s not profitable, it’s not sustainable. No one can continuously work at a net loss.
USA is doing a good job of that.
While China continues to accept USD denominated debt the USA can continue to make a loss.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/current-account
As long as China remains dependent on Australian iron ore, the Australian Government can prop up the “renewables”.
The airwaves in Melbourne are full of heatwave crisis warnings for onr day of 37 degrees C.
The BOM numbers for Melbourne Regional office go back to 1856 or so.
Since then Melbourne has had 850 days above 37C.
That is more than 6 per year on average.
Why all the panic about 1 day a year above 37C?
Constant panic propaganda. Geoff S
Australia should be a leader in thorium liquid salts cooled reactors. https://www.copenhagenatomics.com https://www.thorconpower.com
Don’t exist yet, on a commercially viable scale
BUT..shouldn’t be too far off.. Molten salt reactors were tested back in the 60’s and serious long run testing proved the concept Thorcon have signed a MOU with Indonesia for the supply of a number of 500MW units before 2030… checkout https://thorconpower.com/project/
Thorcon’s business plan is to build the units in shipyards and float to sites, connect, power up, and produce power at something like $30/Mwh..
And I believe there are approximately 180 different companies around the world working on similar projects..small modular reactors etc…
And how long will it take to make 10s of thousands of them? Oh dear!!! The idea is OK but there are so many problems (particularly terrorist protection) that the idea may well not be practical.
We will use the experimental thorium reactors to provide power to fantasy fusion pilot plants for the next 40 years
I never cease being amazed at how devoid of common sense and basic grid engineering understanding uni PhD professors can be. Mann, Oreskes, McKibben…
Rud,
I think Daniel Flynn spelled it out pretty well in his 2004 book; Intellectual Morons! Of course, he didn’t flesh it out as much as is needed to particularly skewer Climastrologists, but it’s a start!
McKibben teaches journalism at a basket weaving college
Thanks, Rud…
I wasn’t clear enuf on my analogy to the Manhattan Project.
It took smart engineers to get the bomb built. The scientists by themselves would have taken years and years. And for some reason nowadays, these PhD folks do not understand economin priciples or have not seen examples of how to destroy and economy.
Gums sends…
Rud,
that is the point they are scientists which is a completely different discipline than engineering, and specifically the very small engineering field of power generation and transmission. Why would they have the basic knowledge of that?
Another field that often jump into the electrical business are economists and statisticians and come out with the same rubbish as Professor Liam Wagner, the subject of this article..
re: “I never cease being amazed at how devoid of common sense and”
To some degree, they are reflecting your basic flaw too, Rud; you don’t – can’t – believe what you read. Take this paper by Dr. Hagen of Delft University (https://research.tudelft.nl/en/persons/wr-hagen) for instance, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360319922022406 *
Maybe you need to go back to reviewing the basic test methodologies used in physics to confirm material properties, and their existence, like EPR (Electron Paramagnetic Resonance) GC (gas chromatography), Raman Spectroscopy among a host of others.
* Paper downloadable from: https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/international-journal-of-hydrogen-energy/vol/47/issue/56
Like medieval doctors. If the bloodletting did not work surely more bloodlettings are called for.
Yep.
….and if only Toyota had fully electrified the Prius 15 years ago the penguins would be saved-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/companies/toyota-is-wasting-an-icon-as-prius-falls-behind-other-brands/ar-AA15Gsvw
Toyota are really getting under the skin of the doomsters with their world leading hybrid range and long queue times.
And at last they have realised that Hydrogen is not going to work!
I don’t think Toyota see a lot of upside in hydrogen for cars vs maybe heavy transport but with their profitability and forward demand they have plenty for dabbling in R&D for combustion engines. They have the smarts and wherewithal to produce full BEVs anytime but they’re sticking with mainstream profitability of the half way hybrid house and consumers know they’re the best.
That really pisses the doomsters naturally but they’re about to discover the EV market leader has hit demand problems with overcapacity in what was always a lux market-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/companies/tesla-used-car-price-bubble-pops-weighs-on-new-car-demand/ar-AA15HAUb
Sell Tesla and buy Toyota in my book.
Fifteen year old renewables are near, if not past, their total lifespans.
Besides, the associate professor, “at the Centre for Food and Resources at Adelaide Univesity{sic}”, Wagner has committed perhaps the most egregious example of ‘logical fallacy’ fantasy.
Leading off with his “if the Aussie government had encouraged more renewables 15 years ago”, “Non Sequitur” logical fallacy, he follows with logical fallacy fantasy after fantasy.
e.g.,”A majority of (coal-fired generators) are far too old to be operating”, said associate professor Wagner from his position at a food and resources center whom doesn’t mind professing expertise regarding coal fired electricity generating plants.
In simple terms, an arrogant twerp, who doesn’t mind at all condemning people to pre-fossil fuel tyranny and historical living conditions.
An associate professor is just a professor-in-training.
Professor in Training?
P I T
That’s just a fancy way to say…not fully indoctrinated…yet
If the Aussie government had encouraged more coal fired power 15 years ago, we wouldn’t be in this situation.
If the Aussie gubment had encouraged the development and build of nuclear power reactors 15 years ago…..
I don’t see how ‘renewables’ could have prevented blackouts and price rises as they are the root cause of coal/gas fired power generators being shut down in the first place and b) are intermittent and incapable of delivering reliable, ‘despatchable’, 24/7 power.
Because business people are greedy, selfish, and self-centered people who concentrate so much on profit that they are simultaneously too pig-ignorant and stupid to see the money to be made right in front of their faces, and thus wise government burrocrats must lead them to the government money trough, and even then it’s an uphill battle to get them to see the reality of green wealth.
LOL 🙂
“By 1860, at least 30 kerosene plants were in production in the United States, and whale oil was ultimately driven off the market. When sperm oil dropped to 40 cents a gallon in 1895, due to lack of demand, refined petroleum, which was very much in demand, sold for less than 7 cents a gallon. …”
****************
So is it safe to say then that petroleum saved (or at least contributed to saving) the whales? And if natural gas and coal reduced or eliminated the human pressure on our forests for firewood, it seems to me that the demonization of fossil fuels is more propaganda than anything else.
And if solar and wind farms (with storage batteries) require more land area than the current fossil fuels infrastructure, it also seems to me that the masses are being fed a false bill of goods from the anti-fossil fuels media, activists and politicians. Especially considering that wind turbines and solar panels leave much more unwanted byproduct (toxic waste) behind per unit of energy produced than do fossil fuels.
I get the sense that we are indeed living in the age of the Orwellian thought control police.
Correction: Wind turbines and solar panels leave much more toxic waste behind per unit of energy produced than NUCLEAR power does.
Whales in a horrible way are a renewable petroleum resource – at least that’s how our ancestors saw them, until something better came along. And they turned out not to be so renewable, when they were almost hunted to extinction.
The corollary here is that abandoning fossil fuels is very bad news for whales.
……and our forests.
Wandering bands of deadfall fuel hunters will much reduce the ability of arsonists to set forest fires.
…maybe /s
I used to wonder about that too: did Rockefeller single-handedly save the whales? But I read an article a few years back which showed whale oil was already in decline before petroleum began making progress; Rockefeller might have quickened the switch by a few years, but that’s all.
Felt like a big letdown. You can google for “Did Rockefeller save the whales” and find quite a few articles saying he did, and some saying no. My guess is no, he just sped it up a few years. He wasn’t the only petroleum bigshot, he wasn’t the only one lowering prices.
Here’s one somewhat biased description, which credits GreenPeace too much for my taste, but does at least try to be half-sane.
https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/l6l8zk/no_game_theory_john_d_rockefeller_did_not_save/
Hilariously wrong. What did people put in their lamps, other than kerosene and whale oil? Whale oil volumes dropped as the whales were hunted to near extinction, but the value of whale oil didn’t drop, it was a lamp fuel crisis. The rise of kerosene took the pressure off, removed a major reason for hunting whales.
Everyone had bacon fat for lamps, but you had to warm the lamp first in your hearth. Fuels that were liquid at room temperature and didn’t smoke much, like whale oil, were a luxury item. Later, kerosene was economical enough to develop high demand.
The highlighted quote by CD states a fact. Anybody can check it for its accuracy, go to a good library. The fact speaks for itself. Therefore the idea that mineral oil did not save the whale is only a trifle short of ludicrous.
re: “So is it safe to say then that petroleum saved (or at least contributed to saving) the whales?”
‘Stories’ like the above also overlook the use of alcohols for this purpose … a little research will show this up …
The title says it all, boondoggle or success, only time will tell:
https://spectrum.ieee.org/amp/green-hydrogen-2658958087
It’s not happening quickly enough. It should have happened 15 years ago
What a load of piffle as in May 2008 12 x 175W solar panels and Fronius inverter went up on my roof costing $22000AUD and the Govt rebated $9500 of that and guaranteed me 44c/kWhr for any feed-in until July 2028. At the time with power costs I worked out I would receive a 10% tax free return on my investment and over the years with power price increases that return was even higher with any self consumption.
After 14.5 years and the Fronius inverter died I scrapped the system for 16 x 415W solar panels and inverter costing me only $5800 for 6.64kW (cf around $17000 in today’s money for 2.1kW back in 2008). With the mercury hitting 40C today in Adelaide we’ve been enjoying pleasant free aircon cooling all day and I’ll install a solar diverter for our storage HWS soon as FIT will only be the 5c/kWhr with the upgrade- https://www.powerdiverter.com.au/
Basically use it or lose it with the solar duck curve in South Australia and being all electric it’s the cheapest storage as batteries don’t pay. So the professor is talking through his hat about incentives 15 years ago but the brains trust forgot all about the fallacy of composition and increasing dumping by solar over all those years. Thanks for the tax free return though numpties particularly when interest rates went to zero.
You’re what we call a subsidy farmer. You produce nothing of value, since all of your generation is as the time that is can’t be used, and you suck gigantic value out of the system – 44c/kWh is much higher than the real value.
And once steam engines came along with their coal-fired boilers, people stopped using windmills……
About 1825, the Dutch wisely decided that windmills weren’t reliable for pumping water from behind their dikes and switched to coal/steam. Still kept as backup…and can pump 2 Olympic sized swimming pools per minute.
https://exploringthenetherlands.com/wouda-steam-pumping-station/
Getting rewarded for failure-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/other/canberra-the-only-place-in-australia-where-failure-is-rewarded/ar-AA15HhqD
You little disingenuous and low-life lying weasel
1/ What yo claim about ‘blue in the face’ is the easiest thing in the world to say. Everybody says that and they say it all the time
2/ But what you have also been /Blue Facing about was to tell everyone (Government) to run-down & shut-down the fossil stations and not allow anymore.
Fine. Epic. Yes. You got your way.
3/ But primarily what you did these last 15 years is repeatedly Cry Wolf. All the claims you’ve made for Climate have simply not happened in any other amount than what would happen normally in a Desert Land such as Australia.
Deserts have Crap Climates. Period.
There are plenty thing anyone and lots of folks can do about that but simply Nobody Wants To Know
In any case, they’d never hear/understand the message above the din/commotion of the incessant tantrum you’re throwing.
Please just stop for a moment’s thought.
Now what you’ve done is effectively cause your Government to panic. Your relentless Blue Facing has driven them to distraction – they have stopped thinking and acting clearly.
Hence the exact situation there is now= Closed down fossils and nothing to replace them.
Thank you so very much.
There ought to be a law about what you’ve been doing, and continue to do.