The cock up that is the east coast energy market

[SaintsSeptember]

Digressing, but there is a plan/suggestion/? to send renewable power to Singapore.

DC transmission is different , and most appropriate for underwater cables and long distances.

Traditionally all power generators produced AC , and had to be synchronised to the grid.
Modern Inverter technology is what has really allowed wind turbines to become feasible, altering the generated frequency to 50Hz.

Normally to transmit DC, you would need to convert the electricity to DC, then back again at the end of the transmission line.
Interestingly PV cells produce DC electricity and it might be advantageous not to convert it to AC at all if transmitting long distances.

I'm sceptical about the Singapore proposal though.
It involves the longest submarine cable ever, 4500Km, and will cost 30 Billion Dollars.

Why do we think that the Singaporeans will pay enough for electricity to pay for that?
Why are we supplying Singapore with solar ( to replace their gas ), when we could use it domestically?

 

[Kwality]

How much storage has a grid with a high level – 90 per cent or more – of variable wind and solar need to ensure there is enough supply to meet demand?

Why Australia does not need so much storage in a wind and solar grid

CSIRO says a grid dominated by wind and solar will only require one fifth or one third of the storage needs commonly suggested.

reneweconomy.com.au

Surely the amount of storage needed without coal &/or gas is known for yesterday, today & tomorrow: NO we dont.

 

[Power Raid]

DC transmission is different , and most appropriate for underwater cables and long distances.

Traditionally all power generators produced AC , and had to be synchronised to the grid.
Modern Inverter technology is what has really allowed wind turbines to become feasible, altering the generated frequency to 50Hz.

Normally to transmit DC, you would need to convert the electricity to DC, then back again at the end of the transmission line.
Interestingly PV cells produce DC electricity and it might be advantageous not to convert it to AC at all if transmitting long distances.

I'm sceptical about the Singapore proposal though.
It involves the longest submarine cable ever, 4500Km, and will cost 30 Billion Dollars.

Why do we think that the Singaporeans will pay enough for electricity to pay for that?
Why are we supplying Singapore with solar ( to replace their gas ), when we could use it domestically?

Singapore has committed to a US/ Australian Small Modular Reactor technology

This doesn’t bode well for for a solar project that would inject billions of tons of CO2 in copper and silica

 

[Power Raid]

I'd argue it is very relevant.

We had the Australian Covid Recovery Board stacked with gas executives. There was one token person from the Labor side of politics and completely unsurprisingly he was a gas executive as well.

Then we have the conservative media who are completely happy to overlook and never report the fact that the gas lobby largely wrote Australia's policy for Covid recovery while at the same time openly condoning violence against climate protesters - cause someone was "impatient".

The reason we have a crisis in the east coast energy market is because the energy companies have been allowed to write their own policies, even worse write government policies, and self regulate with impunity for too long.

At every point both the conservative media and the Morrison government openly ridiculed and condemned any and all dissenting voices - school children, women, climate rallies, and yesterdays incident.

This was done for no other reason to protect gas and coal companies from any scrutiny at all.

It is absolutely relevant. The Morrison government at the behest of the gas and coal lobby created new laws to ban protests, have openly ridiculed and suppressed legitimate protests at every opportunity, have diverted environmental and climate spending to the gas and coal companies and and now we have Sky condoning violence against protests.

And we wonder how we ended up in an energy crisis where the gas and coal companies could hold the entire nation to ransom charging whatever the hell they wanted for gas, coal and energy?

If Australia had not diddled for 9 years, if Australia had not caved entirely to the gas and coal companies which by the way are 97% foreign owned and pay SFA tax or royalties, then maybe we might not be in this crisis.

People absolutely have a right to be pissed off and protest.

This is not democracy.

The gas lobby is anti coal and pro renewables

Big coal means no room for gas. But big renewables means high gas demand and gouging prices.

 

[QuietB]

The gas lobby is anti coal and pro renewables

Big coal means no room for gas. But big renewables means high gas demand and gouging prices.

Are they really "pro renewables"

 

[Power Raid]

Are they really "pro renewables"

shell and bp presented to EY almost 20 years ago and called the unreliable nature was the big opportunity for gas

all they had to do was stand behind "natural gas" rather than "methane".......methane is 25% of the global warming issue. then wait for market failure.

this is why I refer to the comment "no jurisdiction on the planet, with a renewable strategy, achieves 14-70g CO2 without hydro or nuclear. If we measured this in greenhouse gases rather than CO2, then places like DIRTY GERMANY would look totally ridiculous, rather than just ridiculous.

Even after the embarrassment of russian gas deals, the resulting blood on germany's hands, the EU has just rebranded gas as "green energy investment".......despite methane 80 times worse than CO2.



I wonder if schroder and merkel were being well lubed?

 

[Kwality]

the EU has just rebranded gas as "green energy investment".......despite methane 80 times worse than CO2.

Is there one definition for the climate change lobby?

 

[Saint]

Singapore has committed to a US/ Australian Small Modular Reactor technology

This doesn’t bode well for for a solar project that would inject billions of tons of CO2 in copper and silica

The cable is about the same length as it would be if it ran to Melbourne. (4,000km)

But the opportunities along a spine to Singapore would be endless. Singapore would just be the start. The cable goes past Surabaya, Jakarta, Makassar and could then tap into the mainland Asian grid via Malaysia.

The generation capacity of the NT in terms of solar is near endless, and the Asian electrical demand growth is also just about endless.

There's not really any other renewable energy solutions proposed for SE Asia at the moment.

If Suncable get it built, they'll eventually be rich, it's just if they can sustain early losses for long enough.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

If Victoria replaced all of its current fossil fuel electricity with state of the art gas generation we would outperform our CO2 targets.

We currently don't have any state of the art electricity producers.
The average CO2 from gas power plants in france is less than our best one.
The best of the gas power plants in France produce around half the CO2 of our worst ones.

The grid in Victoria is around 1.13 Tonnes CO2/MWh
The average from gas turbines in france is less than 0.5.
The best gas power stations are less than 0.4.

Some of the gas turbines in Victoria are these.

Loading…

prattwhitney.com

We bought them second hand from New Zealand when New Zealand thought they were bad for the environment.
( Ummm still bad for the environment , but NZ can now say "we didn't do it " ).

 

[Kwality]

The cable is about the same length as it would be if it ran to Melbourne. (4,000km)

But the opportunities along a spine to Singapore would be endless. Singapore would just be the start. The cable goes past Surabaya, Jakarta, Makassar and could then tap into the mainland Asian grid via Malaysia.

The generation capacity of the NT in terms of solar is near endless, and the Asian electrical demand growth is also just about endless.

There's not really any other renewable energy solutions proposed for SE Asia at the moment.

If Suncable get it built, they'll eventually be rich, it's just if they can sustain early losses for long enough.

Storage?

 

[SaintsSeptember]

The cable is about the same length as it would be if it ran to Melbourne. (4,000km)

But the opportunities along a spine to Singapore would be endless. Singapore would just be the start. The cable goes past Surabaya, Jakarta, Makassar and could then tap into the mainland Asian grid via Malaysia.

The generation capacity of the NT in terms of solar is near endless, and the Asian electrical demand growth is also just about endless.

There's not really any other renewable energy solutions proposed for SE Asia at the moment.

If Suncable get it built, they'll eventually be rich, it's just if they can sustain early losses for long enough.

a) You can't send and receive DC electricity on the same cable, it then needs to be 2.
b) You can't just tap into such a cable at any point, it would need very specific infrastructure.
c) Borneo is the third largest island in the world.
d) the sun shines over asia.

 

[QuietB]

d) the sun shines over asia.

Except for the man made "clouds"

 

[Power Raid]

The cable is about the same length as it would be if it ran to Melbourne. (4,000km)

But the opportunities along a spine to Singapore would be endless. Singapore would just be the start. The cable goes past Surabaya, Jakarta, Makassar and could then tap into the mainland Asian grid via Malaysia.

The generation capacity of the NT in terms of solar is near endless, and the Asian electrical demand growth is also just about endless.

There's not really any other renewable energy solutions proposed for SE Asia at the moment.

If Suncable get it built, they'll eventually be rich, it's just if they can sustain early losses for long enough.

Near endless?

You mean 6-8 hours a day?

 

[Kwality]

We bought them second hand from New Zealand when New Zealand thought they were bad for the environment.

Which version of We bought them ?

 

[kranky al]

We still have the cocked up east coast energy market & no amount of spin is going to fix it.

'In a statement issued overnight, CEC chief executive Kane Thornton says the capacity mechanism, regarded by most as one of the worst proposals of the Coalition government, yet embraced by the new Labor government, is not necessary.

“Government needs to be looking at ways to bring more clean, low-cost renewable energy into homes and to power industry without paying unreliable and expensive coal and gas to stay open, which ultimately results in more expensive electricity bills,” Thornton said.

“Clean energy and storage can meet our energy and capacity needs and the technology is here now.

“A storage target can accelerate the deployment of batteries, pumped hydro and other means of storing energy when it’s needed. A target worked for renewable energy in its formative years and can do the same for storage.

The push for a storage target is gaining momentum, mainly because it is unequivocally focused on clean technologies that can support the growth of wind and solar.'

“Unreliable and dirty:” CEC urges storage target over capacity mechanism

Clean Energy Council joins growing chorus rejecting capacity mechanism in favour of an energy storage target.

reneweconomy.com.au

Until we have a market that delivers 24/7 power as and where required, we need the dispatchable capacity that coal & gas give us.

So build new coal stations?

Wtf

 

[kranky al]

Near endless?

You mean 6-8 hours a day?

As long as you can store what you make yes. Once you build solar, youve paid all you need to pay bar minor maintenance.

No ongoing costs so you just build lots more than you need and store what you arent actively using.

 

[Power Raid]

As long as you can store what you make yes. Once you build solar, youve paid all you need to pay bar minor maintenance.

No ongoing costs so you just build lots more than you need and store what you arent actively using.

And what is this magical storage system?

 

[SaintsSeptember]

Which version of We bought them ?

The private company who could make a buck, and had no regulations regarding what they made a buck out of.

 

[Saint]

Near endless?

You mean 6-8 hours a day?

I'm sorry, how long do you think the sun shines for in the Northern Territory?

a) You can't send and receive DC electricity on the same cable, it then needs to be 2.
b) You can't just tap into such a cable at any point, it would need very specific infrastructure.
c) Borneo is the third largest island in the world.
d) the sun shines over asia.

a) Once one is laid, laying subsequent cables is a lot easier
b) see a)
c) If you've ever been to Borneo, you would know it's very hilly and a very tropical climate, not the best for solar farms
d) It shines over outback NT a lot more. There's a reason they've gone 800km south of Darwin. Our sunshine is also a couple of hours ahead of theirs.

As for storage, the one thing about the tropical locations this cable travels through is the potential for hydro storage. EVERY project needs to be thought of as part of a larger network. If you look at any electrical project in isolation they don't stack up, they need to be part of a network. Solar in outback Oz is probably THE cheapest renewable generation option, transmission brings the cost for consumers up, but once the initial investment is made, all subsequent upgrades will be magnitudes cheaper.

Solar is a balance of scale of generation vs cost of transmission. The story here is that they want generation as large as it can go to justify the transmission costs. Solar in Vic compromises generation and scale by having it closer to population centres where there's less sunshine and smaller plots, but reduces transmission costs.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

I'm sorry, how long do you think the sun shines for in the Northern Territory?


a) Once one is laid, laying subsequent cables is a lot easier
b) see a)
c) If you've ever been to Borneo, you would know it's very hilly and a very tropical climate, not the best for solar farms
d) It shines over outback NT a lot more. There's a reason they've gone 800km south of Darwin. Our sunshine is also a couple of hours ahead of theirs.

As for storage, the one thing about the tropical locations this cable travels through is the potential for hydro storage. EVERY project needs to be thought of as part of a larger network. If you look at any electrical project in isolation they don't stack up, they need to be part of a network. Solar in outback Oz is probably THE cheapest renewable generation option, transmission brings the cost for consumers up, but once the initial investment is made, all subsequent upgrades will be magnitudes cheaper.

Solar is a balance of scale of generation vs cost of transmission. The story here is that they want generation as large as it can go to justify the transmission costs. Solar in Vic compromises generation and scale by having it closer to population centres where there's less sunshine and smaller plots, but reduces transmission costs.

Yes i've been to Borneo. Plenty of flat land. Lots of hills too, but not where the flat land is. It used to be forrested but Merbau timber.

If there was plenty of opportunity for Hydro storage in the areas the cables travel through ( a bit of Indonesia ) wouldn't you expect them to have some level of Hydro power already?

You're entitled to your opinion on the project, i just know i wouldn't be investing my money in it in a fit.

 

[Saint]

Yes i've been to Borneo. Plenty of flat land. Lots of hills too, but not where the flat land is. It used to be forrested but Merbau timber.

If there was plenty of opportunity for Hydro storage in the areas the cables travel through ( a bit of Indonesia ) wouldn't you expect them to have some level of Hydro power already?

You're entitled to your opinion on the project, i just know i wouldn't be investing my money in it in a fit.

Indonesia's market is around the other way. They struggle to attract industrial investment because there's no decent infrastructure such as water and electric.

Indonesia’s First Pumped Storage Hydropower Plant to Support Energy Transition

The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors today approved a US$380 million loan to develop Indonesia’s first pumped storage hydropower plant, aiming to improve power generation capacity during peak demand, while supporting the country’s energy transition and decarbonization goals.

www.worldbank.org

The world Bank finally financed a pumped hydro project (because nobody else would). But again, if you think of a broader SE Asia market with huge generation from Aus, huge demand in Singapore/Malaysia/Java, plus pumped hydro across Indonesia and Malaysia as well as hydro generation, solar from Aus is a good fit for the dry season (why Hydro isn't great for generation in those areas, the dry season).

If Australia was tapped into that market we could replace coal exports with solar exports. And they can store the power in hydro, just like they store our coal on ships/big-azz piles.

Worth noting that the Indonesian Archipelago (touching on Singapore and Malaysia) is 4,000km, so about the same size as Australia's East Coast energy market. A connection to Darwin and eventually the Australian east coast grid is probably inevitable rather than unbelievable.

 

[kranky al]

And what is this magical storage system?

Batteries, pumped hydro, craned weights

All of these things work and yet weve thrown money ar carbon capture…

 

[Power Raid]

Batteries, pumped hydro, craned weights

All of these things work and yet weve thrown money ar carbon capture…

Yes yes

The great conspiracy despite no jurisdiction on the planet supporting your claim (14-70g CO2) and the representations by battery manufacturers that they are used to assist grid stability rather than storage

 

[Power Raid]

I'm sorry, how long do you think the sun shines for in the Northern Territory?


a) Once one is laid, laying subsequent cables is a lot easier
b) see a)
c) If you've ever been to Borneo, you would know it's very hilly and a very tropical climate, not the best for solar farms
d) It shines over outback NT a lot more. There's a reason they've gone 800km south of Darwin. Our sunshine is also a couple of hours ahead of theirs.

As for storage, the one thing about the tropical locations this cable travels through is the potential for hydro storage. EVERY project needs to be thought of as part of a larger network. If you look at any electrical project in isolation they don't stack up, they need to be part of a network. Solar in outback Oz is probably THE cheapest renewable generation option, transmission brings the cost for consumers up, but once the initial investment is made, all subsequent upgrades will be magnitudes cheaper.

Solar is a balance of scale of generation vs cost of transmission. The story here is that they want generation as large as it can go to justify the transmission costs. Solar in Vic compromises generation and scale by having it closer to population centres where there's less sunshine and smaller plots, but reduces transmission costs.

How many hours do you think you can generate solar in the NT

Having close to 12 hour days minus the book ends, that is very limited for a city with 24 hour needs.

I guess you could simply by a reactor to supply the night or just buy a reactor for day and night and dispose of the need of all that copper, batteries, silica and huge environmental footprint.

But this is about arm waving not clean energy

 

[Saint]

How many hours do you think you can generate solar in the NT

Having close to 12 hour days minus the book ends, that is very limited for a city with 24 hour needs.

I guess you could simply by a reactor to supply the night or just buy a reactor for day and night and dispose of the need of all that copper, batteries, silica and huge environmental footprint.

But this is about arm waving not clean energy

Peaks are all during the daytime hours. Singapore uses 95% natural gas at the moment. They could reconfigure those to run more when solar drops off in the evenings, they can also used pumped hydro from Malaysia or Indonesia for the AM peaks when solar supply will take off before demand.

This is only going to be 15% of Singapore's needs, but I bet they'd love a hedge against gas prices right now, the prices has tripled in a year and they don't have an alternative source.