The war against renewable energy

[Pessimistic]

I see a time when there’s sun solar hydro type generation everywhere, but even if it’s on someone’s property the power companies manage it for you, with finance / benefit sharing arrangements. More local generation = more efficient and reliable grid

 

[quotemokc]

Jesus some of you are promoting the ongoing perpetual use of coal for power like it s a measure of your debating/arguing skill.

It’s not going to be turned off overnight, but as Rachel Hunter says, It will happen

You realise coal came from the sun in the first place? These now technologies are just streamlining the supply chain

We are going to keep using coal until we run out of it.

 

[Hawk Dork]

We are going to keep using coal until we run out of it.

I wouldnt put my money on that

If we tried to burn all of it, there wouldn't be a civilisation around that would need it to be burned.

 

[Pessimistic]

We don’t just use fossil fuels for energy

 

[Kwality]

Jesus some of you are promoting the ongoing perpetual use of coal for power like it s a measure of your debating/arguing skill.

It’s not going to be turned off overnight, but as Rachel Hunter says, It will happen

You realise coal came from the sun in the first place? These now technologies are just streamlining the supply chain

Renewables does not equal dispatchable power to the everyday user, is that a debating point? Hope not!

 

[Kwality]

We don’t just use fossil fuels for energy

Energy, renewable energy is the point of this discussion.

 

[Pessimistic]

Renewables does not equal dispatchable power to the everyday user, is that a debating point? Hope not!

Energy, renewable energy is the point of this discussion.

Losing argument, seeks to redefine or narrow it.

 

[kranky al]

Renewables does not equal dispatchable power to the everyday user, is that a debating point? Hope not!

I just dont get this attitude - geraldton has a large solar array, 2 large windfarms and a gas plant - the gas plant is largely idled. Its capable of about 110 mw from memory. It spins up on those incredibly rare occasions theres no sun and wind here and to rectify voltage. The voltage rectification is planned to be taken over by a startup as i mentioned before that is going to install batteries at peoples houses to form a distributed generation and storage power company.

The solar farm produces 10mw (nearly finished an expansion to 30 mw) the mumbida wind farm 55kw and the alinta windfarm 90 mw

More often than not when you drive through the area - the two windfarms have half, three quarters or more of their turbines idled as they are generating enough power with a handfull of the turbines.

We have nice clean air as a result.





<<<<CDP names over 100 cities reporting at least 70% of their electricity is from renewables, including Auckland; Nairobi; Oslo; Seattle and Vancouver.
Over 40 cities are currently operating on 100% renewable electricity. These include Burlington, Basel and Reykjavík.
Over 80 UK towns and cities commit to run on 100% clean energy by 2050, announced today by UK100.
February 27th, 2018: Cities are increasingly reporting that they are powered by renewable electricity, according to data published today by CDP. The global environmental impact non-profit CDP, holds information from over 570 of the world's cities and names over 100 (see list below) now getting at least 70% of their electricity from renewable sources such as hydro, geothermal, solar and wind.
The list includes large cities such as Auckland (New Zealand); Nairobi (Kenya); Oslo (Norway); Seattle (USA) and Vancouver (Canada), and is more than double the 40 cities who reported that they were powered by at least 70% clean energy in 2015.
CDP’s analysis comes on the same day the UK100 network of local government leaders announce that over 80 UK towns and cities have committed to 100% clean energy by 2050, including Manchester, Birmingham, Newcastle, Glasgow and 16 London boroughs.
According to the World Economic Forum, unsubsidized renewables were the cheapest source of electricity in 30 countries in 2017, with renewables predicted to be consistently more cost effective than fossil fuels globally by 2020.>>>>

Source: https://www.cdp.net/en/articles/cit...s-get-majority-of-electricity-from-renewables

 

[Lebbo73]

View attachment 614129

Who’s the elephant in the room?

 

[Lebbo73]

Nuclear energy generation is old and extremely dangerous both in generating energy from nuclear reactors and from having to store the waste, some of it for 24,000 years! It takes years and years to build nuclear reactors, approximately 7 years and the cost is extraordinary.

The unfortunate thing is that people fall hook, line and sinker for this discredited and extremely dangerous, old technology. If we were to spend the same amount of money in exploiting the incredible amount of renewable and safe resources that abound in this country, we'd be paying next to nothing for our fuel when the initial cost of setting up the energy production and the distribution infrastructure from these vast, limitless and safe resources was paid for.

The only thing standing in the way of getting very cheap and very safe energy to all of Australians and Australian enterprises are the vested interests who reckon that they, the privateers, should control everything and make squillions out of these technologies and most importantly to them, is the fact that they don't want to give up making the squillions they make now by using 19th century, toxic technologies. There is also of course, the fact that some people, those who are being poisoned by and ripped off by these ancient technologies, these very same people go into bat for those who are killing them, their children and the planet and paying through the nose for the privilege of being annihilated!

Germany makes a liar of you. Head in the sand, head in the sand. It’s your way or the highway. Green religion has warped your brain.

 

[Pessimistic]

Germany makes a liar of you. Head in the sand, head in the sand. It’s your way or the highway. Green religion has warped your brain.

Green religion is a straw man statement.

What we are talking bout is mainstream

 

[kranky al]

Who’s the elephant in the room?

Gina rhine the hutt

 

[Kwality]

I just dont get this attitude

The recent brownout in Vic didnt effect me personally but a couple of acquaintances had to close their doors. That equals my attitude, reliable power is not too much to ask, e.g a couple of years back the cricket commentary from India was interrupted by power outages & commentators were forced to use mobile phones - s******s about 3rd world infrastructure.

 

[Kwality]

Losing argument, seeks to redefine or narrow it.

My ask is relable power, that is not an argument for or against, its about today, tomorrow, when you move the switch, the light comes on.
Half baked arguments by protagonists either wat leave me cold. I'm happy to post anything either way that is about today.
As I have said before my folks installed solar power in the 70s, I'm not new to the space.

 

[Pessimistic]

The recent brownout in Vic didnt effect me personally but a couple of acquaintances had to close their doors. That equals my attitude, reliable power is not too much to ask, e.g a couple of years back the cricket commentary from India was interrupted by power outages & commentators were forced to use mobile phones - s******s about 3rd world infrastructure.

It was extreme circumstances, albeit more common due to the much denied climate change. I’m behind the people wanting to sensibly address that rather than the ones who seem unprepared to listen, or chose policies mainly designed to wedge their opposition, which seems to be the reason the coalition now have NEG amnesia.

The electorate has not forgotten though

 

[Hawk Dork]

good article about how a nation accepts change and wants it faster

Coal bites the dust in Germany, Europe's greenest nation
A leading mainstream politician in a major industrial nation this week said the country will phase out coal power, completely, in less than two decades' time.

Imagine the blowback if an Australian politician - Labor or Liberal - tried that.

But this is not the first time German Chancellor Angela Merkel has pulled a stunt like this.
In 2011, a few months after Japan's Fukushima disaster, she abruptly ordered the shutdown of almost half the country’s 27 nuclear reactors and set a timeline to take the rest offline by 2022.

The loudest protests came from people who thought that wasn’t fast enough.

This week some muttered about higher energy prices and energy security concerns over Merkel’s 2038 coal phase-out decision.
But just as loud were complaints that it could all be done a decade faster if the government really put its mind to it.

The Greens were even in power, in coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD), in North Rhine-Westphalia, the heart of the coal and steel industry.
There were arguments over coal.
At the time the Social Democrats, many of whose members came from the industrial working class, resisted the Greens’ moves to change the agenda.

But the clock was ticking.
In 1990 there were 115,000 employees in the brown coal sector of reunited Germany.
Now there are only 20,000.
And there are 330,000 workers in renewables.
“Workers and their families are voters,” .

https://www.theage.com.au/world/eur...europe-s-greenest-nation-20190208-p50wh0.html




https://www.theage.com.au/world/eur...europe-s-greenest-nation-20190208-p50wh0.html

 

[quotemokc]

good article about how a nation accepts change and wants it faster

Coal bites the dust in Germany, Europe's greenest nation
A leading mainstream politician in a major industrial nation this week said the country will phase out coal power, completely, in less than two decades' time.

Imagine the blowback if an Australian politician - Labor or Liberal - tried that.

But this is not the first time German Chancellor Angela Merkel has pulled a stunt like this.
In 2011, a few months after Japan's Fukushima disaster, she abruptly ordered the shutdown of almost half the country’s 27 nuclear reactors and set a timeline to take the rest offline by 2022.

The loudest protests came from people who thought that wasn’t fast enough.

This week some muttered about higher energy prices and energy security concerns over Merkel’s 2038 coal phase-out decision.
But just as loud were complaints that it could all be done a decade faster if the government really put its mind to it.

The Greens were even in power, in coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD), in North Rhine-Westphalia, the heart of the coal and steel industry.
There were arguments over coal.
At the time the Social Democrats, many of whose members came from the industrial working class, resisted the Greens’ moves to change the agenda.

But the clock was ticking.
In 1990 there were 115,000 employees in the brown coal sector of reunited Germany.
Now there are only 20,000.
And there are 330,000 workers in renewables.
“Workers and their families are voters,” .

https://www.theage.com.au/world/eur...europe-s-greenest-nation-20190208-p50wh0.html




https://www.theage.com.au/world/eur...europe-s-greenest-nation-20190208-p50wh0.html

"In 2011, a few months after Japan's Fukushima disaster, she abruptly ordered the shutdown of almost half the country’s 27 nuclear reactors and set a timeline to take the rest offline by 2022."

That is what is known as a knee jerk reaction. Merkel also opened the floodgates for millions of middle eastern *immigrants* into Germany, how is that working out for them?

Its no surprise that Germany has such high power prices with all their 'green' initiatives.

Below is France's methods of power production, interesting that two relatively similar countries can have such wildly different means of power production and power cost difference.

France has also never had a nuclear disaster in 50 years of having nuclear plants.

This site here is also quite good to see Germanys power production as raw data.

https://www.energy-charts.de/power.htm?source=all-sources&year=2018&month=11

 

[Kwality]

It was extreme circumstances, albeit more common due to the much denied climate change. I’m behind the people wanting to sensibly address that rather than the ones who seem unprepared to listen, or chose policies mainly designed to wedge their opposition, which seems to be the reason the coalition now have NEG amnesia.

The electorate has not forgotten though

So will batteries equal Liddell when it closes soon, i.e the end of its commercial life? Thats a real world date. Got nothing to do with ideology, & its approaching.

 

[Pessimistic]

So will batteries equal Liddell when it closes soon, i.e the end of its commercial life? Thats a real world date. Got nothing to do with ideology, & its approaching.

It’s got everything to do with the failure of this coalition government to provide a framework that they themselves said was their most important policy task, but now want to pretend does not exist, or ‘because labor’
And it’s not ideology, it political bastardry.

On the whole I think we agree more than disagree. It probably frustration which is fuelling (pun not intended) this thread

 

[Hawk Dork]

blah blah blah

you missed this part of the article

This week some muttered about higher energy prices and energy security concerns over Merkel’s 2038 coal phase-out decision.
But just as loud were complaints that it could all be done a decade faster if the government really put its mind to it.

 

[quotemokc]

you missed this part of the article

This week some muttered about higher energy prices and energy security concerns over Merkel’s 2038 coal phase-out decision.
But just as loud were complaints that it could all be done a decade faster if the government really put its mind to it.

So people were complaining the people wouldn't be able to afford power even sooner?

 

[Hawk Dork]

So people were complaining the people wouldn't be able to afford power even sooner?

I think your missing the point of the article .
There is a political will for change despite the short term power prices

 

[quotemokc]

I think your missing the point of the article .
There is a political will for change despite the short term power prices

Thats because Germany still has an image problem from WW2.

If they are not seen to be doing the 'right' thing it reflects badly on them.

Why is France so much more advanced when it comes to power production in comparison?

 

[Hawk Dork]

Thats because Germany still has an image problem from WW2.

If they are not seen to be doing the 'right' thing it reflects badly on them.

Why is France so much more advanced when it comes to power production in comparison?

Frances prices went up by more than Germanys in the same time frame
Up by 40% compared to Germanys 39% increase

 

[Power Raid]

It was extreme circumstances, albeit more common due to the much denied climate change. I’m behind the people wanting to sensibly address that rather than the ones who seem unprepared to listen, or chose policies mainly designed to wedge their opposition, which seems to be the reason the coalition now have NEG amnesia.

The electorate has not forgotten though

Extreme circumstances? Renewables contributed f all with it being too hot for solar to work and too still for wind.

This is a regular outcome rather than extreme.