Essay by Eric Worrall
“… Australia has a wealth of coal and gas resources as well as renewable energy, so why are energy costs so high …”
Rich in resources, but Australia’s energy costs have tripled and manufacturers are hurting
…
“[The US is] pro-manufacturing, they’ve got cheap energy, they’ve got good gas supply and reserves. It’s one of the most attractive markets to invest today,” he said.
Mr Gandhi said one solution to the problem in Australia is to increase the supply of gas.
But it is already too late for many Australian manufacturers.
“If you start investing today it takes three to 10 years to bring on new gas resources … [and] manufacturers won’t survive [that long],” he said.
…
Plastics manufacturer Qenos went into administration last year blaming the lack of a reliable supply of gas and rising costs.
…The federal government did not respond to the ABC’s questions about a decision, but a statement from a spokesperson for Energy Minister Chris Bowen blamed the coalition for the gas shortfall.
…Bruce Robertson, a former stockbroker and fund manager who is now an independent energy consultant, said Australian manufacturers were “bleeding to death” due to high energy costs.
He blamed the gas export companies operating the export terminal in Gladstone in Queensland.
…Liam Wagner is an associate professor at Curtin University’s Institute for Energy Transition, researching new technology in electricity markets and how gas prices work in the eastern states.
He thinks manufacturers should focus on alternative fuels like hydrogen rather than hope for government intervention.
…
Read more: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-01-13/gas-energy-costs-threaten-manufacturing/104788984
The fact that nobody in government or academia seems to understand the problem, let alone have viable ideas for solving it, is bad news for what is left of the productive sectors of Australia’s economy.
Imposing a gas reserve or export quota on gas companies would at best buy a few years. Gas companies would respond to the increased risk of damaging government intervention by redirecting new gas field development elsewhere. Why should gas companies gamble on Australia’s hostile energy regulation landscape, when they can participate in Trump’s energy renaissance?
As for hydrogen, I’m not going to bother answering that one. Feel free to ask other WUWT commenters why hydrogen is a bad idea, if you genuinely believe this is a possible solution.
Packing up and relocating to the USA or Asia might save some businesses. Though given the growing string of bankruptcies, it may already be too late for many of them.
Update (EW): One of Quenos Plastic Manufacterer’s plants was in Melbourne, Victoria. Quenos relied on gas from Altona Refinery, an adjacent oil refinery. The oil refinery shut down in 2022. This is triggering a cascade of closures of adjacent businesses which piped gas or other petroleum products directly from the refinery, including Quenos.
The Victorian State Government could have acted to ensure a plentiful gas supply for businesses like Quenos, but instead of trying to help industry, in 2021 the Victorian Government added a permanent ban on fracking to the state constitution. This hostile regulatory act likely convinced Quenos and businesses like it there was no hope for a profitable future, which may have been a factor in their decision to close.
When I first read “Atlas Shrugged” I thought the description of cascading industry failures in the book breathed real life into the plot. Now I am seeing it play out in real life.
At some point people will realize that the prices aren’t high, its because the money is worthless.
There’s that.
It’s even worse than worthless. Every dollar borrowed from the private central bankers to pay someone for their goods or services comes with interest attached. (I think they call this “Babylonian money magic”) But where do you get the money to pay that interest? You have to borrow more money from the same bankers, which costs even more interest. The system is designed to collapse from the outset.
yeah, but do they have abundant sunlight???
We do – 20GW in the middle of the day, but little when needed at the morning and evening peaks where a few diesel gensets still kick in.
The Australian yearly average solar efficiency is only 16.3%, not much above Europe and UK’s efficiency at 10-11%.
MAGA is pretty simple to execute.
?MAuGA
Golden MAGA that MAuGA!!
Make Aurum Great Again?
Make gold great again.
Make Australian Gas Available?
Make Albanese Go Away?
Conventional wisdom says it takes 3+ years to build a new coal fired power plant. I reckon that’s made up of 2 years to get all the paperwork done, 1 year to actually build it, and then maybe a century to get approval to start using it.
“Make Australian Gas Available?”
Australian Gas is available. Problem is, it is available to everyone in the world, and goes to the highest bidder.
There is PLENTY of extra gas available under the ground.
Green scum lawfare and stupidity keeps it there.
How long has Santos been trying to get that huge area in the Pillaga (north west NSW) producing !
It is destined for NSW consumption only.
And absolutely HUGE amounts available in Victoria as well.
Australian Gas is available. Problem is, it’s still in the ground and blocked from development.
Yep. Victoria even put a fracking ban in the state constitution.
Thta isn’t a problem – it is basic supply and demand.
Supply and demand, regulated by price. The complaint here is about the price.
Regulated by government overreach is more the problem than demand based pricing. Curtail the supply, given a fixed demand, and the price goes up. ECON 101.
For Western Australia, that’s wrong, as their gas reservation policy keeps 15% of all gas for domestic and industrial uses. This gas price is under half that of the eastern states, and is used along with coal to generate most of WA’s cheap electricity.
Yes, indeed. And the gas firms still make plenty of profit at those prices. But that was a specific policy action of the WA Labor government in 2006.
Try 1979 … North West Gas Development (Woodside) Agreement Act 1979
https://www.wa.gov.au/organisation/department-of-jobs-tourism-science-and-innovation/wa-domestic-gas-policy-updates
Make Albo Go Away!
With no footing except in French support, Clement’s papacy would have vanished like smoke, and the ruinous schism brought to an end, if the French had made that their object. But they did not. To admit error and cut losses is rare among individuals, unknown among states. States function only in terms of what those in control perceive as power or personal ambition, and both of those wear blinkers.
Barbara W. Tuchman A Distant Mirror, the Calamitous 14th Century 1978 p. 459
.
Australia’s current government is doing their best to emulate the French court in the 14th century in virtually every policy area and, particularly, the energy sector.
.
Tuchman’s observations of the typical behaviours of State players can be found replicated in every edition of the Australian media (except for the ABC)
See her book “The Guns of August” re. the problem of state players really spinning out of control.
“He blamed the gas export companies operating the export terminal in Gladstone in Queensland.”
Well,there is somebody getting it right. Gas goes to the highest bidder, which is the export market. If you can’t match that, then no gas for you. And finding more gas won’t change anything. It will still be exported unless locals pay the export price.
Moving to the US might work for a while, but Trump is determined to boost LNG exports, which will replay the same sequence..
Going all in on “renewables” drives up prices, everywhere.
But the wind is free. Right, Nick?
Forgot the /sarc tag. Sorry.
You know there is plenty of extra gas under the ground.
Stupid leftist governments and green tape refuse to let it be accessed.
“It will still be exported …..”
You are wrong and I am sure you know that…
… the new fields planned would have been for Australian consumption only.
There are no gas export terminals in Victoria or NSW but they are getting import terminals.
Really quite ridiculous, isn’t it. !!
Both states have huge reserves of gas.. but no-one can use it.
Just DUMB !!!
Why should gas companies develop resources in Australia and be forced to sell below market value, when they can divert money to develop resources in Trump’s USA and sell it at global prices? The only way this would make sense is if developing resources in Australia was so much cheaper than developing resources in the USA, it compensated for the lost profit. Or if Australia becomes so desperate for gas they start paying a premium over international prices to get some attention, which is the more likely outcome of gas rationing.
“Why should gas companies develop resources in Australia and be forced to sell below market value, when they can divert money to develop resources in Trump’s USA and sell it at global prices?”
I’m not saying they should. But there is no point in complaining about high prices if you are plugged into the world market. The point about the USA at the moment is that export capability is limited, so they can’t easily sell at world prices. Trump wants to fix that – OK, then US locals will pay world prices, as we do. Biden wanted to delay that.
“Or if Australia becomes so desperate for gas”
There is no way Australia will be desperate for gas. We export at least two thirds of production. You can have as much as you want, at that price.
Here is the history. Exports hit a covid bump, perhaps reaching a limit of export capability. But that won’t last long.
How long do you expect that surplus to last if investment is pulled?
I fully expect export restrictions to be imposed. Lucky I live in a warm part of Australia.
“I fully expect export restrictions to be imposed.”
Then the gas price will come down. But gas producers were doing just fine under the old regime, which is when most of our gas was discovered. Of course, exporting is a huge windfall for them.
I’ve no doubt they’ll run existing wells into the ground and keep producing for a few more years. But what is at risk is future investment.
It’s simple economics to invest in the place which returns maximum profit. USA / world market prices vs Australia / sovereign risk. You don’t need to be Einstein to figure out the answer to that question.
Spot on, Eric.
Geoff S
Don’t confuse poor Nickie with simple economics! That’s just cruel!
We should be asking him if he still believes in rainbows, unicorns, and Unreliables being cheaper than fossil fuels!
With apologies to J. M. Barrie. “Do you believe in inexpensive wind and solar? If you believe, clap your hands!”
Nick,
Easy to say high windfall profits.
Evidence needed.
The profits are not coming from Australian pockets. Are high profits (if they exist) not a lovely benefit to Australians as portion of the profits get reinvested in Australia.
Geoff S
Geoff,
Clearly, if you find gas and start producing in a low price regime, as we had, and then you can strat selling at twice the price, that is a windfall.
And Australians then pay those higher prices too. That is out of thieir pockets. Eric’s article conveys the complaint.
The state governments could just invoke retention laws they own the gas not the companies who only have extraction licenses.
The question none of you are asking is why don’t they invoke WA type retention laws?
Perhaps a start point
https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Economics/Australiasoilandgas/Report/section?id=committees%2Freportsen%2F024380%2F78881
Windfall=large profits….large profits=large corporate taxes….large large profits=large dividends to shareholders…large dividends= large income taxes for the investor class…..all these are good things for governments and average taxpayers, especially if the money to pay for the commodity comes from outside your borders….if the government has the foresight to invest in long term infrastructure instead of government worker salaries…..
When governments get desperate enough to win back the electorate with cheaper energy prices, they will capitulate to reality and develop their gas and coal resources, making sure there are enough quotas for domestic consumption and some for export around Australia or offshore. The ideological climate alarmists and ex-communist Greens will just have to wear it, just as we have been suffering their immature environmental tantrums for the last two decades that created our current anti-science energy debacle. Enough of the environmental BS, we want cheap electricity and economic progress, jobs not self-induced recession, an identity crisis, housing crisis, mental health crisis, defense crisis and now a foreign policy crisis.
This country has gone to hell since 2007, with a succession of poor or incompetent leaders and no statesmen or women. The current government is rotten with self-interest, and tired socialist ideology, it can’t see the wood from the trees and deserves to be thrown out ASAP
We can only hope that reality and science can prevail in future under a new administration.
Correction: Last 5 decades, although it is more likely 7-plus decades.
Over a century here in the US since the Left, beginning with the ‘Progressives’, began subverting the Constitution.
According to Trading Economics the current world price of natural gas is 3.90 USD per MMBtu which converts to about 6.3 AUD per MMBtu.
The ABC time-series graph of wholesale gas prices in Australian states shows current prices around 12 AUD per gigajoule which would roughly convert to about the same per MMBtu which is double the world price.
“current world price of natural gas”
That isn’t the world price. It is the US price at the Henry Hub in Louisana.
“US natural gas futures dropped by around 1% to $3.90/MMBtu on Monday, retreating from a two-year high reached the previous session, despite a 10% surge earlier in the day. The decline came even as forecasts for colder weather and higher heating demand loomed, with freezing pipelines and reduced flows to Freeport LNG’s export facility in Texas limiting supply.”
See how it goes? Ifexport is restricted, the price goes down.
If local production increases for local usage..
Price goes down.
Apart for a spike around July 2022 the price of US natural gas for a decade at least has been at about half the price within Australia, that has nothing to do with freezing pipes, if US producers can get higher prices exporting to Japan and China etc. why don’t they.
Also there must be a cost to processing and shipping LNG to export markets that does not apply to the domestic market.
“why don’t they”
Current export facilities (in the Gulf) have limited capacity.
Are those Texas gas pipelines that are freezing the same ones that froze before because electric heaters were ordained by policy, rather than gas heaters that do not stop when the electricity stops?
Or are these remedied pipelines failing because it is even colder than forecast in a once-warming world? Geoff S
‘…the current world price of natural gas is 3.90 USD per MMBtu…’
Gee, that would be about $29/MWh based on a heat rate of 7.5 for a middling CCGT.
Meanwhile, New England ISO is showing current real time LMPs above $150/MWh.
Thank goodness for the war on carbon! (/s)
Uhm Nick? You’re not making sense here.
If the export market sets the price, why are electricity prices not rising all over the world?
How is it that other jurisdictions have low energy costs if they are paying the exact same amount for gas as Australia?
Seems to me something is different in Australia, and the price of gas on world markets has nothing to do with it, or the whole world would be in the same pickle as Australia. I agree with you on some things, disagree on most, but this is circular reasoning that makes no sense at all.
BTW, your comment that the US is only a temporary haven because Trump wants to export more LNG also makes no sense. He wants to scale production up, what part of “drill baby drill” did you not understand? He wants to drive the price of LNG down across the whole planet, oil too, by increasing American production and export. He’s not going to build SO much export capacity that he screws over his own economy, he’s going to scale production first. Hence “drill baby drill”.
David,
“why are electricity prices not rising all over the world?“
Seems WUWT is consuantly telling me that they are.
“How is it that other jurisdictions have low energy costs if they are paying the exact same amount for gas as Australia?”
Which would they be?
“in the same pickle as Australia”
We are not in a pickle. We can have as much gas as we want. We just have to pay what will dissuade producers from exporting it.
“what part of “drill baby drill” did you not understand?”
The trick is to find something. It’s a great slogan for people who don’t have to pay for the drilling.
The US has about 25% of world production, which for now mostly is taken up by local consumers. It takes a lot of optimism to think that that slogan can significantly shift world prices. The US will also come up against the inexorable arithmetic that we are seeing – if you export it, you don’t have it any more.
“We can have as much gas as we want.”
Yes, if we are allowed to drill for it. !!
NSW and Vic have absolutely huge reserves…
… just get the totally idiotic anti-human, anti-progress green tape out of the way.
OR you could just change the law 🙂
Which would they be?
You can google as easily as I can. The point is you cannot blame prices so high on energy in Australia that energy intensive businesses are closing down. NG is a commodity, the whole world pays the same price, and the business’s that closed down did so because they could not compete. The products they used to make are being made elsewhere in the world, in jurisdictions where energy is more affordable.
We are not in a pickle.
The first step in finding a solution to a problem is recognizing that you have a problem.
The US has about 25% of world production, which for now mostly is taken up by local consumers. It takes a lot of optimism to think that that slogan can significantly shift world prices.
The US when from net importer to net exporter and drove down priced globally as a result. Quite a few drill baby drill outfits went bankrupt as a result. They will be more cautious this time. However, deregulation and opening up of federal lands with current drilling bans will open up many new production opportunities. Twisting the arm of states like New York to lift their drilling bans would open up still more.
The wild card is Canada. The Trudeau government has been strangling drilling in Alberta and Saskatchewan for 9 years. I don’t know why this isn’t obvious, but Trump’s drill baby drill includes Canada. Canadian crude shipped to US refineries for export to global markets. Canada’s reserves dwarf the US. Trump wants to strangle the economies of Iran, Russia, Venezuela by sanctioning their output and driving down what revenue they can get that slips through sanctions. Trudeau being gone in a matter of weeks, a new government will probably buy into that. If Australia were to kick in, it would big help.
David, some of it is about timing. Customers who sign up for long term supply contracts (often take-or-pay basis) when gas fields are being developed lock in low priced. When they renew, they pay current price. And some people buy on spot markets.
You’re almost there. You’re looking for the pea under the thimble and have almost found it.
It is the unstated and false assumption that wind and solar are cheaper means of electricity generation than gas or coal, because there are no fuel costs. Its not stated, but this is the underlying view. High prices cannot be due to this, they must be due to rising gas prices. What else is there?
This has been repeatedly refuted by Paul Homewood who has compared the actual bid prices of wind operators with the actual price of the same amount of energy delivered in gas. Gas is cheaper.
So if a country moves its generation to wind and solar, prices will rise. If it moves to electric heating and transport, those costs too will rise. If you implement the endless subsidies to make the wind and solar electricity seem cheaper to the end use, taxes will rise or bills will rise or more likely both.
The higher recent power prices have nothing to do with the price of gas, they have to do with the fact that even at current gas prices, wind and solar cost more to supply the same amount of energy. The more wind and solar you insist on installing, the higher your electricity costs will be, and these will end up, one way or another, getting charged to users.
You can bet that the blame for this will be assigned to rising gas prices. The blame for increased home heating costs, after moving everyone to heat pumps, will either be denial (they are not really higher) or assigned to the user (they are operating them wrong).
The end of the world did not happen on Thursday after all. Its because we had misread the prophecies. It will happen on the first Friday in March, a year from now. And the faith of the faithful will intensify. We are in the middle of a collective hysteria on the part of the intellectual class. Its clearing gradually, but it still has a while to run.
“after moving everyone to heat pumps”
According to the IEA there was a large fall in heat pump sales in Europe in the first half of 2024.
In the UK the industry is telling the Government that their targets are totally unrealistic and that almost 40% of people training to be heat pump engineers do not go on to work in the industry but Miliband won’t take his fingers out of his ears.
In 2023 less than 40,000 heat pumps were installed in the UK. There are over 22m homes in the country on the gas grid, and whilst a Government grant of £7500 is available towards the cost of installation British Gas says the average extra cost in 2023 on top of that for its customers was £5,690.
Add in that electricity is FOUR times more expensive than gas and how many of that 22m are going to opt for a heat pump? Or can even afford to do so?
Note the industry is also telling the Government that the difference in energy prices “is just too wide.”
Something like five times as much gas is exported from Western Australia. They have a policy of local companies being able to compete on price for the gas, but there aren’t many people in Western Australia so it doesn’t have much effect. It isn’t easy to get the gas from west coast to east coast where most potential customers are.
WA exports about twice as much gas as Qld. But the east coast is still quite self-sufficient, or should be. It should be easier to get gas to Sydney than to China.
Nick,
You must know the following, but I do not know why you do not discuss it.
A cure for high prices is more competition.
If I was exploring again, I would heed the claims that there is abundant gas awaiting development in Victoria. Irrespective of international gas prices, I would corporately set about pegging some prospective land, then applying for exploration and mining permits in the age-old, successful way. The aim is to supply a hungry local market for way less price than international, will making an adequate but visible profit, as corporations do.
Why are there not hordes of entrepreneurs, cashed-up and ready to run?
Because the Victorian Government is hostile to gas development in the State. The State has primary mineral ownership, it calls the main shots.
Unless there is change, fracking is banned, govt policy. Leases will not be issued for conventional gas drilling, govt policy.
Say goodbye to entrepreneurs, sa hello to higher and higher gas and electricity prices for domestic consumers.
Government policy is anti-development, anti-growth for industry and jobs, anti common sense and driven by anti-capitalist policy makers.
In a nutshell, no competition equals higher prices for gas and electricity. Remedy, promote competition.
Geoff S
Geoff,
Leases were issued for the Otway basin. There just turned out to be little gas. That can happen.
Exactly what you get from a woke leftist green government. No question Labor/Greens are anti FF industry and hate it. Bowen is on record as saying with some pride at a COP talkfest that he is responsible for destroying the FF industry in Australia. Bowen is an Australia hating globalist idiot, and the sooner he is gone the better.
One just needs to observe the idiocy of Bowen, he is a fool, a climate zealot who wants 90% renewables or something like that. He lives in a globalist green blob of a world, surrounded by groupthink discontents, sycophants, and grifters.
Australia also has the added problem of governments and bureaucracies beholden and worshipping to the activist ‘ecological’ indigenous lobby. Industry can’t put a shovel in the ground, let alone create coal and gas leases and infrastructures, lest they disturb the ‘ancient cultural superstitions; of ‘traditional custodians’.
What FF companies would even attempt to invest in Australia, notwithstanding the wealth of resources available, (resulting in increased wealth and living standards for all Australians), with such idiotic policies driven by climate ideology and ancient myths. Even id companies attempted, activists use lawfare and the courts to undermine attempts to get any major projects off the ground.
Is there any developed country where the electricity prices have not risen to high levels since the push for “renewables” started? No. End of discussion.
Nope every country that pushed renewables has increased exponentially. There is an extension to that manufacturing and heavy energy users also relocated to another country unless propped up by government.
My Australian friends swallowed CAGW hook, line, and sinker at the beginning.
It is bloody hard to change their minds. Stubborn as a Galah they are.
Harold the Organic Chemist Says:
CO2 Does Not Cause Warming Of Air!
Please go to: http://www.John-Daly.com. This is the late John Daly’s website:
“Still Waiting For Greenhouse”
From the home page scroll down to the end, and click on “Station Temperature Data”. On the “World Map” click on “Australia”. The charts of the annual average temperatures of the weather stations show no warming up to ca. 2002. You should print out these charts and show or give them to your friends. The chart for Adelaide (See below) starts in 1857 and shows an overall cooling trend to 1999.
At the MLO Hawaii, the concentration of CO2 in dry air is 425 ppmv. One cubic meter of this air contains 0.835 g of CO2 and amass of 1.29 kg at STP. In air with a temperature of
70 deg. F and 70% RH, the concentration of H20 is 14,780 ppmv. One cubic meter of this air has 11.9 g of CO2, 0.78 g of CO2, and mass of 1.20 kg. To the first approximation and all things being equal the amount of the greenhouse(GHE) effect due to water is given by:
GHE = moles H2O/moles H2O + moles CO2 = 0.66/0.66 + 0.018 = 0.97 or 97%
Keep in mind that H2O covers 71% of the earth’s surface.
The above calculations and empirical data show that the claim by IPPC is a deliberate lie. The purpose of this lie is to provide the UN the justification to distribute the donner funds,
via the UNFCCC and the UN COP, from rich countries to the poor countries to help them cope with claim global warming and climate change. At the recent COP29 conference in Baku, the poor countries came clamoring for not billions but now trillions of funds. The poor countries left the conference empty handed with no pledges of funds from the rich countries. The pledged donner funds for COP28 was 57 billion dollars.
The CAGW is not possible because ca 80% of the world population live in poverty and on less than $10 a day.
BTW: You should print out this comment and give a copies to your friends and your local politicians. Once they learn the truth, all this global warming and climate change nonsense would vanish over night.
Sorry, but eliminating a religion takes more than over night.
You should also tell your friends to visit this site everyday.
More proof that their ABC is worthless and yet it consumes $3.3M per day.
The reason is staring them in the face but they are too moronic to appreciate it. Blinded by TDS and captive to the same globalist carp that drives their BoM and their CSIRO. All three organisations. ABC, BoM and CSIRO are working against the interests of Australia.
Dutton has the appearance of growing a pair but barely visible. I would prefer Abbott and Credlin front and centre in the policy arena.
The confiscation and destruction of the means of production is the purpose of Marxian and Fabian communism. Suffering is meant to increase, not be alleviated. This allows “Labour” to stab workers in the back, elected governments to strip farmers of their land, animals, seed, and fertilizer, bureaucrats to kill off non-productive (everyone) classes and groups, the legal system to undermine law and order, and intelligentsia and party nomenklatura to foment general violence and destruction. It will stop when a perfect communism appears. California, Australia, and formerly Great Britain ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
Ayn Rand was being gentle.
Climate zombie apocalypse.
The recent abandonment of gas exploration in the Otway Basin Victoria is typical example of how green groups have nobbled gas projects in Australia, that together with Labor governments’ bans on hydraulic fracturing.
If the Greens get anywhere nearer to power in the forthcoming election it’s ‘lights out’.
That is nonsense. Over the last decade gas wells were drilled, production started, pipelines laid, a gas plant built and connected to the state’s network. The only problem was that there just wasn’t very much gas. Beach has further exploration permits which it is actively pursuing.
One of the earlier disappointments, Iona, has been converted to a rather important national storage facility.
The same as I’m saying the EU economy is beyond the turning point. If they want to save something they need to build coal and gas powerplants immediately. In best case this will take 5 years but realistic speaking it will them much longer, they have no sense of urgency. You can’t keep blaming it on ignorance, even Bob around the corner understands that energy is everything.
I’ve thought about your last comment about seeing “Atlas Shrugged” in real life. But this is more stupid governance crushing Atlas who is still fighting hard to make things work. When Atlas shrugged, just think what things will look like.
But this is more stupid governance crushing Atlas
Basically the middle third of the book
“Wind and solar are free!” — Nick Stokes
Nick will have to revisit that.
Lazards have finally admitted that their LCOE did not recognise the cost of firming the intermittency of wind and solar – that is the cost required to provide power when there is not enough wind or sun to meet load demand.
It has only taken them 16 years!
Better late than never! I think a lot of lies are going to start to unravel now…
Hydrogen is not a “alternate fuel.” It’s production is a net energy sink. It take more energy to produce it than it delivers.
nobody in government or academia seems to understand the problem
Didn’t the problem start with the introduction of “renewables”?
I used to work with a cutting tool manufacture in Victoria, but they had to pull out of US when Ford reduced operations. It got too expensive for them to expand into a world market.
Very nice Eric. This is a prime example of why government should not be involved in energy production or transmission. They are not held accountable, they don’t suffer the pain of their crappy policies and if their programs don’t pan out they create mandates to change our behavior and double down on the spending of the failed program. If they were a private enterprise they would have to change what they are doing or go out of business. Government just sucks at this kind of stuff, get them the hell out of the energy business.