Renewable Troubles in Australia

[h=2]Bonfire Electricity Bills! Two day heat wave burns nearly $400m: $45 per head in Vic, $80 each in SA.[/h]
While geniuses are bragging that the Australian grid survived two normal hot summer days without falling over, they don’t mention the flaming spectacle of the cost.
Tom Quirk and Paul Miskelly, after a couple of suggestions from me, have calculated the full staggering electricity bill at $119m for SA and $267m for Victoria, making it nearly a $400 million dollar bonfire — for two days that were neither the hottest ever, or records for peak electricity use. See their work and details below.
To put this in perspective, a whole new gas plant could have been built for around $230 million. Instead of vaporising this money, Australians could have constructed one whole new gas generation plant, paid it off, and had money left over to give away free electricity.
Every household of four in Victoria just lost something like $170 of productivity for two days of electricity, and in South Australia, $280. Respectively, $45 per Victorian and $80 per South Australian. While businesses also share this burden, ultimately companies are made of people, and this is productivity lost to both states. The losers are shareholders, customers, and employees. Some will be interstate, but the pain flows back. The price is also paid in higher cost items, lower investment, and fewer jobs. Coles and Woolies still have to cover the cost of keeping the fridges running. The money will be squeezed out of citizens one way or the other.
And this is not the total bill, it’s the excess electricity bill above and beyond the normal but inflated January prices of the last few weeks. Even normal prices now are twice what they were in 2015. Back then, the average price in Victoria and SA was $35 per megawatt hour and the average peak price was $49/MWh. Now the average and peak costs on a January day are $82MW/h, and $87/MWh respectively.
But wait, it’s worse than that. Even above this excess electricity price, there is the price of buying the diesels (a secret ’til the $400m bill was revealed), plus the cost of all the businesses which bought their own diesel generators (aren’t we a first world country any more?), plus the cost of all the “Demand Response” — the mini blackouts required to stop the system breaking (more on that tomorrow).
Then, then, there is the awful cost of all the businesses that were affected — the stress, the lost production, the investments that won’t happen, and the bizarre spectacle of Australia not having enough electricity to keep the lights on at our hospitals. We are leading the way to the third world! . . .

[h=2]Madness and misinformation in renewables-land: South Australia brags they didn’t have to “load shed”[/h]
Hope foreign readers are enjoying the spectacle of a first world nation destroying its competitive advantage with renewables. Hope that helps you avoid the same fate.
[h=4]Praise the lord, states without coal don’t have to load-shed-industry (because they don’t have much left):[/h]The South Australian Treasurer is bragging that SA didn’t have to shed any industry load on Friday, but the coal state of Victoria did. Pull the other one:
“In terms of supply we should be okay,” he [the SA Treasurer] said.
“Victoria I understand is about to load shed industry. So they’re not coping with the power supply.
“They are a coal-dependent state and they are having to take industry offline to support their households. In South Australia we’re not having to do that today.” — h/t A H
The Treasurer didn’t mention that SA shed the load already over the last two years by driving heavy manufacturers out of business, and out of the state. Let’s name some:
Gone from the SA power load: Mitsubishi, GMH, Plastics Granulating Services (Recyclers), Caroma (76 jobs) after 79 years in business, Penrice, Arnotts biscuits (120 jobs), Aldinga Turkeys (79), ACI Glass (60 following previous 50 jobs), Arrium (600), BHP (90), SANTOS (~200), Alinta Energy (Pt. Augusta power stations and Leigh Creek mines) (438), Unibooks (100), United Dairies (>100). Plus many more…
Nor did he mention that when peak times hit, SA couldn’t generate enough electricity for itself, even at $14,200/MWh and was drawing around 350MW from Victoria (which was mostly coal fired).
[h=3]ABC rent-seekers do free PR for Labor-Green-renewables:[/h]The ABC political reporter Nick Harmsen, above, swallowed this one-sided Labor party fantasy, and didn’t bother to interview anyone (skeptic or industry) who knows what rot the Treasurer was speaking. Harmsen probably votes Labor (or Green), has been trained not to “seek balance” lest the public vote out the innumerate, expensive vanity-signalers, who also pump up the ABC budget, at up and coming SA election.
I’m sure no one ordered him to toss his journalistic standards, but if he ever showed any talent for asking real questions it would have been quashed in the tea rooms, or, was pre-quashed at university, where everyone is trained to think the exact same way.
In masterful form, Harmsen described the Lack of Reserve level 2 (LOR2) notice as meaning “there is a small buffer of surplus left”. Nice spin-winner-way to put an emergency notice that is there to let the market know the buffer is frighteningly small, and far below recommended.
At LOR2 level, things are so bad, the AEMO is throwing our money at the electrical grid to keep it from crashing.
If only he had the internet or a phone he could have used the actual AEMO terms. At least he wouldn’t look like a PR hack instead of a journalist.

[h=2]South Australia blows up cheap electricity, jobs, wealth, in ideological anti-coal quest[/h]
Today the South Australian government destroyed the smoke stack of the Playford B Plant, one more part of what’s left of the cheapest base-load electricity generators in the state.
For about $8 million a year over three years, they could have kept some coal power going and wouldn’t have needed to spend $400 million on emergency diesel generators they don’t want to use, and over $100 million on a battery that can supply 4% of the state for one hour. They also would’ve paid less than $120 million for two days of electricity last week.
On the upside, they can feel good and pretend to be “world leaders”. Virtue signalling is expensive, eh? . . . .

[h=2]Melbourne: 42,000 homes in dark, no fans left at Kmart. Power outages due to “secret” air conditioners?[/h]

Melbourne Skyline at night…Image: Alfred Glickman
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The temperature reached 38C in Melbourne (100F) on Sunday — something it has probably done most summers since 10,000BC.
CitiPower, Powercor and the United Energy spokeswoman Emma Tyner said that as of 9.25pm, about 41,190 homes were without power across those three networks. – Sydney Morning Herald
Now why would that be? Ms Tyner puts a lack of supply in the nicest possible way:
“The extreme heat has significantly increased electricity use and this has resulted in localised power outages,” Ms Tyner said.
It’s not that governments didn’t plan energy policy — it’s the users who wanted too much (i.e your fault.) Though Victorians used to use more power than this. On Sunday, peak electricity demand was 9,124MW, about 13% less than the all time peak of 10,496MW in 2009. (In case you are wondering, Hazelwood (now closed) produced 1600MW or about 25% of Victorian baseload power.)
Mr Armstrong from Ausnet Services (another power company) blamed unreported air conditioners:
“There are a lot fuses blowing in the hot weather and a significant power pull with people having put in air-conditioners they didn’t tell us about,” Mr Armstrong said. — The Age
Who knew you needed to tell your power company when you put in an air conditioner?
Gone are the days when people could willy-nilly run down to Retrovision and just buy an air con.
Ms Tyner and Mr Armstrong may have inadvertently let the cat out of the bag. Perhaps they will get quiet reeducation tomorrow on how to phrase the cause of blackouts. (Aren’t they due to old coal turbines breaking?)

Next, expect people to start saying how normal it is to have blackouts on hot days. “It’s just a part of life.”
If only the same people would say that about hot days.
[h=4]You know things are serious when Kmart runs out of fans.[/h]A Kmart in Northcote on Sunday has completely sold out of all cooling devices, from fans to air-conditioning units, its duty manager said.
So no willy-nilly fan buying either.
Tonight some people have fans, but no electricity. Others have electricity but no fans.
Others have electricity and fans, but no money. Luckily electricity “only” reached a peak of $3,125 per MWh briefly in Victoria. (Only a few million extra). . . .

Political Vandals: Victoria, the diesel state, bans, hides, cheap cleaner gas, blames fuses, air conditioners


How much do we hate Lignite Gas?

Victoria is suffering the largest rises in wholesale electricity prices in the country, as it sits on large gas fields that it won’t touch. Why — geniuses hope to reduce global droughts and floods and sea level in 2100.
Robert Gottleibsen savages the state governments that conducted the renewables experiment without mentioning the real costs or the cheap alternatives.
If Victoria allowed its gas to be developed the energy scene in Australia would be transformed, as would the outlook for the nation.
But that’s not much consolation for those in vast areas of rural NSW and Victoria plus suburban Melbourne and small areas of South Australia who suffered blackouts or reduced power on Sunday night. It’s true part of the outages were caused by fuses, but the outages were too widespread. It’s another smokescreen.
If similar conditions are repeated on weekdays and/or extend over several days the blackouts will be devastating as a result of the political vandalism. Government spin doctors and others are desperately trying to conceal the truth about the damage governments headed by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian (plus her predecessors Mike Baird and Barry O’Farrell) and South Australia’s Jay Weatherill have caused.
South Australia suffered its blackouts last year so it was appropriate that this week’s blackouts were worst in Victoria — just as the residents of the gas-rich state discovered they suffered the biggest wholesale gas price rises in the country. --The Australian
It costs a lot to conceal that much cheap gas

Specifically, it takes a $42 million committee to not consider the things that matter.
The art of bureaucrats is to make a lot of noise about pots and kettles in the hope that no one notices the elephant.
Taking its concealment one step further the Victorian government last year appointed a $42 million committee which this month declared the state short of onshore gas, but it did not look at the vast reserves of lignite gas that don’t require fracking (because development was banned) nor the reserves of Lakes Oil in Gippsland and the Otway (because Lakes Oil are suing the government). Unbelievable.
But they did reveal a fascinating diagram, which showed that Lakes Oil’s Otway areas are linked to those in South Australia. A few days after the report Beach discovered a major find in South Australia six kilometres from the Victorian border. --The Australian
. . . .

[h=2]Panic! Put up a solar panel or tourism will lose $40b in Australia. (Sure, and people “want” cold holidays.)[/h]
Another variation of Climate-Panic was unleashed today on hapless tourism operators. The whole entire $40b tourism industry in Australia is at risk apparently. Here are three points the doom-mongers and our “journalists” didn’t think of:

1. People like hot weather holidays. “Climate change” (if it happens) would mean longer beach seasons, more greenery, and coral reefs could spread.
2. Average temperatures vary by 14C across Australia. The average January maxes range from 22.5C to 36.5C. Some fans of the renewables industry want you to believe that a two degree rise will wipe the nation off the list of visitable places, as if Hobart at 24C will be unvisitable? Sure. (Please sell me your tourist resorts now.)
3. In recent record breaking hot years, international tourist arrivals to Australia have grown 40%. See the devastating effect of the last super hot years on international tourism to Australia.

Amos Aikman in The Australian:
[h=3]‘$40bn at risk’ as climate change threatens tourism[/h]Australia’s $40 billion tourism *industry is in danger, with visitors likely to face more bad weather, deadly jellyfish and damaged beaches due to climate change, the Climate Council has warned.

Some of the nation’s most prized natural assets, such as Uluru, Kakadu and Ningaloo Reef, are most at risk from rising temperatures, while more than half of the continent could see conditions deemed “unfavourable” for visitors by 2080, the council says.
“Climate change is placing one of Australia’s most valuable and fastest growing sectors under threat. In 2016 alone, more than eight million international visitors arrived on our shores to see our natural icons, bringing in more than $40bn.
“In fact, tourism employs more than 15 times more people in Australia than coalmining.”
The ABC :
Good Weather or your Money Back : how climate change could transform tourism

[h=2]Third blackout in Victoria — blame the possums[/h]
Australia has a gold plated network, which is why our electricity is so expensive.
However we also have gold plated possums:
[h=1]Distributor blames possums for third power outage[/h]More than 20,000 homes in Melbourne’s southeast had another night without electricity on Sunday, the third major power outage for Victoria in three weeks.

An Ausnet spokeswoman confirmed 23,915 customers were left without power for about 90 minutes from 11.42pm in suburbs including Bayswater, Boronia, Ferntree Gully, Heathmont, Knoxfield, Scoresby and Wan*tirna. She said the power cut was the result of a fault at the Boronia substation, which could have been triggered by leaves or branches or other plant debris flying into overhead power lines, or animals, birds or possums on the line.
Incredibly bad luck.
Or not. They don’t really know why this blackout occurred yet.
Workers are still investigating the cause of the fault…
The Victorian government blames the privately owned retailers, and has ordered them to pay compensation. This is the funny asymmetry with electricity pricing – it costs less to generate it, than to not generate it. A 3 – 20 hour blackout might “earn” $80 in compensation.
Keep reading →

[h=2]How much do we have to pay people to NOT use electricity – up to 30 times more?[/h]
To understand the real value of electricity, consider the price at which people will give it up. “Demand Response” is the nice euphemism for a voluntary blackout. At what point do people volunteer to go without? For most of the market, apparently, it’s more than $7500/MWh.
If I read this graph correctly, look how fast the prices rise, and how small the response is. For example, in South Australia there is only about 10MW available at less than $300/MWh? (From this AEMO report). For reference the total SA demand is around 1500MW. So 10MW is less than 1%.

(See below for the
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Consider how few people are willing to turn the electricity off:
AEMO expects there to be approximately 50 MW of demand response in NSW when the price reaches $1,000/MWh.
The total size of the NSW state market is about 10,000MW. Retail electricity sells for $250 — $470MWh (and only $100/MWh in the US). Hence when the price hits two to four times the normal retail cost of electricity, only about 5% of the market say they will willingly stop using it. When the price hits $7500MWh another 2% will give it up. We can’t take this reasoning too far, but the message is clear that the pain of giving up electricity costs a lot more than generating it. Demand is “inelastic”.
Electricity generation creates wealth. People value the product far above the cost of production.
We could raise prices but business locations are “elastic”….
Keep reading →

[h=2]Electricity prices fell for forty years in Australia, then renewables came…[/h]
[h=3]Electricity prices declined for forty years. Obviously that had to stop.[/h]Here’s is the last 65 years of Australian electricity prices — indexed and adjusted for inflation. During the coal boom, Australian electricity prices declined decade after decade. As renewables and national energy bureaucracies grew, so did the price of electricity. Must be a coincidence…
Today all the hard-won masterful efficiency gains of the fifties, sixties and seventies have effectively been reversed in full.

Indexed Real Consumer Electricity Prices, Australia, 1955-2017.
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For most of the 20th Century the Australian grid was hotch potch of separate state grids and mini grids. (South Australia was only connected in 1990). In 1998 the NEM (National Energy Market) began, a feat that finally made bad management possible on a large scale. Though after decades of efficiency gains, Australians would have to wait years to see new higher “world leading” prices. For the first years of the NEM prices stayed around $30/MWh.
But sooner or later a national system is a sitting duck for one small mind to come along and truly muck things up.
Please spread this graph far and wide.

Thanks to a Dr Michael Crawford who did the original, excellent graph.​

For decades the power price fell,
In Australia, where the system worked well,
But renewable power,
For each kilowatt hour,
Shot up prices and rang its death knell.–Ruairi​

[h=1]Ruling Climate Fanatics Obliterated in Aussie State Election[/h]Guest essay by Eric Worrall h/t JoNova – South Australians have finally tired of economic misery and expensive, unreliable green electricity; the government which created the mess has just been crushed at the ballot box, 25 seats to 18. Jay Weatherill quits as leader after losing South Australian election Outgoing premier says he will stay…
Continue reading →

[h=2]Australian elections: Left-Green lose — Weatherill’s revolutionary battery powered state runs out of power[/h]
[h=3]The government running the renewables crash-test-dummy state of the world has lost[/h]In South Australia, Jay Weatherill is gone. Resigned. Tally so far: Libs win 24 seats, Labor 18. Though according to commenters SA voters were choosing between Lite-Left and Hopeless-Left. The new premier will likely be less-bad. Xenophon (small alternate non-establishment player) was crushed. He didn’t side with either Labor or Libs, so voters probably felt they couldn’t afford to sit on the fence and risk more years of Weatherill’s reckless industry-destroying state government.
The Greens are down from 8.7% to 6.6%, a fall of 25% in their popularity. (Not that I could find any news headlines to that effect).

The message for the soft left:
Chris Kenny: [A Lib win] … will flash a warning to Labor in Victoria, Queensland and Canberra about the perils of ambitious renewable energy targets prioritising climate gestures over electricity affordability and reliability.
The Libs appear to have made the most of hi-tech analytic campaigning. The Kochs and others in the US have set up i360:
Through i360 the SA Liberals believe they have progressed to a new level of targeted campaigning… the MP called up a marginal seat, much like finding a suburb on Google Maps, then zoomed in to a street where pins identified addresses deemed to house swinging voters. Deeper dives on households contained genders, ages, voting intentions or lack thereof as well as policy interests. The information is collated from the party’s existing Feedback system, updates from doorknocking and calls, responses to surveys conducted via email, online or phone calls plus census data and the harvesting of social media data. This is Big Brother meets grassroots campaigning. Neither the data nor the technology is much use without quality information fed in and strong analysis leading to the right strategies, along with diligent personalised attention in follow-up visits and communications.
Billionaire US Republican sponsors Charles and David Koch are major investors in the firm, which openly canvasses only for “free-market” candidates. The SA Liberals purchased a product licence and have worked with i360 to modify systems for compulsory and preferential voting. Motivated by the frustration of 2014 where, despite a huge popular vote win, just a few hundred votes in the right seats would have made all the difference,…